Infection prevention practice and its associated factors among health care workers at Wachemo University comprehensive specialized hospital, Southern Ethiopia

Background: Healthcare-acquired infections are a typical global problem mainly in low socioeconomic countries. The acquisition of nosocomial infections may result in prolonged hospitalizations, high antibiotic resistance, lifelong disability, early death, and financial burden on health systems. However, there is scarce data about the level of practice towards infection prevention among Health Care workers and associated factors particularly in the study area. Objective: To assess infection prevention practice and its associated factors among healthcare workers working at Wachemo University Compressive Specialized Hospital in Hadiya Zone, Southern, Ethiopia. Methods: A facility-based cross-sectional study was conducted among 379 randomly selected healthcare workers at Wachemo University Compressive Specialized Hospital in Hadiya Zone, Southern, Ethiopia, from July 15 to 30, 2022. Self- administering questionnaires were used. Binary logistic regressions were used to assess the association between the outcome variables and the explanatory variables. The adjusted odds ratio along with 95% confidence interval and p-value less than 0.05 was declared as significant to the outcome variables. Results: The study found that 168 (45.9%) healthcare workers (95% CI: 40.7%-51.0%) had good infection prevention practices. Having more than five years of work experience (AOR: 4.48, 95% CI: 2.45-8.16), getting in-services training on infection prevention (AOR: 2.17, 95% CI: 1.303.63), and awareness of the existence of infection prevention guideline in their institution (AOR: 5.59, 95% CI: 3.14-9.92) were significantly associated with the good practice of infection prevention. Conclusion: Nearly half of the healthcare workers had good infection prevention practices. Having more than five years of work experience, taking in-service training on infection prevention and awareness of the existence of infection prevention guidelines in the institution were all significant factors associated with good infection prevention practices.