Conocimientos, actitudes y prácticas de estudiantes de odontología frente a los accidentes de riesgo biológico institucionales de la Universidad Santo Tomás

Abstract

Introduction: health students have a high risk of suffering biohazard accidents, which are those situations that can trigger undesirable effects on health, ranging from irritative skin lesions to infections. In the case of dentists, exposure to different fluids such as saliva, infected aerosols and surgical instruments, among others, is added. Objective: to determine the knowledge, attitudes and practices related to biohazard accidents of undergraduate Dentistry students at Santo Tomás University in 2023. Materials and methods: this research is an observational, descriptive cross-sectional study, where Sociodemographic variables and those related to knowledge, attitudes and practices regarding biological risk accidents that they may face during the exercise of their functions were analyzed. The sample consisted of 141 dental students from the sixth to tenth semesters and they carry out their clinical practices at the university. A descriptive analysis was carried out with absolute frequencies and percentages and bivariate analysis through the Chi2 tests and Fisher's exact test. Results: in the study, the participation of the female sex predominated, with ages between 19 and 24 years and from the seventh and ninth semesters. It was evidenced that the knowledge was a bad level in 56% and with a good level in attitudes in 51.8% and practices in 32.3%. No statistically significant associations were found between knowledge and sociodemographic variables, however, in attitudes it was significant with the variable age and practices with academic semester with values p <0.05. Conclusion: it can be evidenced that there are shortcomings in the knowledge of biological risk in the students, but in terms of attitudes and practices, they present a better management when carrying out their clinical activities