Occupational Health Hazards and Safety Measures Practiced among Dental Health Care Workers in Federal College of Dental Technology and Therapy Enugu State, Nigeria

Abstract

The study determined occupational health hazards and safety measures practiced among dental health care workers in Federal College of Dental Technology and Therapy Enugu state. Four specific purposes with four corresponding research questions and two null hypotheses guided the study. The descriptive survey research design was used for the study. The population for the study consisted of 400 dental health care workers in Federal College of Dental Technology & Therapy Enugu. The entire population was used and therefore there was no sampling. A validated occupational health hazard for dental health care workers and safety measures questionnaire served as the instrument for data collection. Descriptive statistics of frequencies and percentages and chi-square statistics were used to analyze and answer the research questions and hypotheses respectively. While ANOVA was used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance, the result of the study showed that Dentists encountered high occupation health hazards (26%), Dental nursing and Dental Assistants encountered average occupational health Hazards (13.26%) and 16.44%, less than 10 years working experience had low safety measure practiced (29.8%), and 11-15 years and 16 years above years of working experience had overall safety measures practiced (48.34% and 44.1%) and 44.1%) respectively. There was no significant difference in the occupational health hazards encountered by dental health care workers according to cadre (p>.05) while there was a significant difference in the safety measures adopted by dental health care workers according to years of working experience (p<.05). Based on the findings of the study, it was recommended that management should improve the working conditions of workers and organize seminars, education programmes and ergonomic interventions to ensure that workers remain healthy.