Profile of health care workers infected with SARS-CoV-2 infection in a central district in Kerala with focus on infection control practices

Abstract

There were reports of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 infection cases among health-care workers from all around the world. We did a cross sectional study among 533 COVID19 affected health-care workers. About 87.43% of participants were involved in duties not directly related to COVID-19 management. About 19.6% contracted the disease from their colleagues. About 15% of the affected health-care workers had at least one comorbidity and diabetes mellitus was the most common (5%). 57% of participants presented with fever followed by body ache in 40%. Only 0.4% of the participants needed ventilator support during treatment. 36% of the participants reported household transmission from them. Adequate personal protective equipment (PPE) usage and functioning infection control committee in their hospital were reported by most of the participants. The study points towards the need of adequate PPE use in the nonCOVID settings and the need for periodical assessment of infection control practices.

Keywords

• covid 19
• health-care workers
• severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 infection