Investigating the Status of Hospital Waste management of Dehdasht City in 2016

ABSTRACT Introduction and Purpose:Not controlling hospital waste and neglecting its proper collection, preservation, conveyance and disposal will have special problematic consequences. Moreover, lack of knowledge about hospital waste management endanger people's health and environment. Therefore it should be collected and discarded according to hospital residue management rule. The purpose of the current study is to investigate the status of hospital waste management of Dehdasht city in 2016. Procedure:The research was carried out as a cross-sectional descriptive study in Dehdasht city hospital in 2016. In addition to determining the status of production, storage, collection, transportation and disposal of hospital waste, waste components, weighing garbage and produced waste per capital were specified during four seasons and during 7 consecutive days of each month. Data were collected through checklist, observation, interview and referring to the hospital (under study) in person. The collected data were analyzed and reported using SPSS software. Results:The result showed that the total amount of produced hospital waste was 2125 kg in 2016; The portion of infectious waste was 1332 kg which accounted for 62% of the total hospital waste in 2016 and waste production per capital for each active bed was about 0.7 kg per day. The components of hospital waste weight percent include infections waste 63%, ordinary waste 30%, sharp waste 5%, chemical waste 2%. It should be mentioned that the maximum percent of waste was related to women's Department (18.76%), Ear, nose and throat (19.44%) and dialysis (24.24%). Conclusion:The results indicated that infectious waste and its danger and also the way it is handled and disposed of should be considered more than before. Hospital waste management is not at the optimum level. Therefore the authorities should pay more attention to this issue. Some actions should be taken to reduce waste production and to separate infectious waste at the point of production; Additionally modern ways of making hospital waste harmless should be utilized. Therefore in order to reduce the environmental effect of hospital waste, modifications of some of the management methods are necessary.

Hospital waste, Waste management, Hospital