Abstract:
Background: Patient safety is the reduction of risk of unnecessary harm associated with
healthcare to an acceptable minimum. It has been identified as a global priority area where
substantial knowledge gaps exist and where further knowledge would significantly contribute to
improving patient safety and reducing harm. However, little is known about undergraduate
health science students’ knowledge, attitude, and practice towards patient safety in Ethiopia.
Objective: The aim of this study was to assess the knowledge, attitude, and practice about
patient safety among undergraduate health science students in Jimma University (JU).
Methods: An institution based cross sectional study was conducted from May to November,
2021 on 678 health science students of JU who had exposure to clinical rotations. Self-
administered questionnaire was used to collect the data. The collected data was entered into Epi
data 3.1 and cleaned and analyzed using SPSS version 21. Bivariable and multivariable logistic
regressions analyses were employed to identify factors associated with outcomes of interest. P-
value of <0.05 was used as a level of statistical significance.
Results: The mean age of the participants was 23.93(±1.606) years; 429(63.3%) were male.
More than half, 355(52.4%) of them were medical students and 263(38.8 %) were in the fourth
year of their training. Only 43.2% and 45.4% of the students had good knowledge and positive
attitude towards patient safety, respectively. Moreover, only 19.9 % of the students had good
practice towards patient safety. Year of study [AOR =14.371, 95% CI 2.311; 89.356], duration
on practical attachment [AOR =2.645, 95% CI 1.186; 5.901], and knowledge about patient safety
[AOR =1.958, 95% CI 1.141; 3.358] were associated with better patient safety practices.
Conclusion: Less than half of the student’s had good knowledge and positive attitude towards
patient safety. Moreover, only few of the students had good practice towards patient safety.
Hence, patient safety courses should be included in the curriculum of health science students to
address these gaps
