286 PIMS employees trained on hospital waste handling.

ISLAMABAD, November 05, 2009 (Balochistan Times): Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) has provided training to its 286 staff members on handling of hospital waste. According to hospital sources, out of total staff members 229 nurses, 54 housekeeping staff and three dressers have completed their course on the subject. Three batches have been trained so far in three courses have been initiated for doctors, nurses, paramedics, dressers and housekeeping staff. They said, such courses will also be started for other hospitals of twin cities of Rawalpindi and Islamabad. The hospital management has decided to continue this week-long course till all the concerned staff of the hospital was trained to handle the waste safely. During training courses, the participants are being trained on how to prevent infections including the importance of hand washing, role of gloves, use and disposal of sharps, house keeping and waste disposal, instrument processing and use of aseptic techniques. Deputy Director PIMS Dr Waseem Khawaja said that objective of such courses was to create awareness about importance of hospital waste handling, identifying and categorizing the different types of hospital waste, enumerating the different steps involved in the hospital waste management, encouraging proper usage and safe disposal of sharps and comprehend infection prevention techniques. He said, the daily risk waste of PIMS is 150 kg while non risk waste was more than 1000kg per day. He added, the risk waste is sent daily to Holy Family hospital under strict precautionary measures, while the non risk waste is disposed off by the Capital Development Authority (CDA). He added the risk waste of hospital included sharp used needles, used blood and urine bags, intravenous cannulas, used sharp surgical blades, used intravenous drips, gloves and laboratory waste.

(THROUGH ASIA PULSE)