The incidence of needle stick injuries among medical students at Tabriz Imam Reza hospital in 2014

Background and aims: Needle stick injuries are a common and serious occupational hazard in the medical settings. So, this study was aimed to assess the incidence of needle stick injury among medical students at Tabriz Imam Reza Hospital in 2014. Methods: This is a cross-sectional study which its data was collected from 211 medical students in Tabriz Imam Reza Hospital. The study was done using valid and reliable researcher's made questionnaire in December 2014 with getting inform consent from participants. The mentioned tool has two main parts; the first part studies the demographic and background variables and the second part focuses on the phenomenon of needle stick injuries and its relevant parameters. The data were firstly analyzed descriptively and the obtained results reported the qualitative variables in form of frequency (percentage) and for the quantitative variables the mean (standard deviation) was reported. Further on, the statistical relationship between demographic and background with Needle stick injuries parameters were assessed using Chi-square test. All these analyses were conducted using SPSS software and in all cases the significance of P was considered as less than 0.05. Results: Obtained findings showed that 36% of the medical students have experienced needle stick injuries in the last year (with Confidence Interval of 95%) and the mean annual frequency is equal to 3.11 times per person. Moreover, the study findings indicated that there is a statistical relationship between needle stick exposure and age (P=0.019), educational level (P=0.001) and the hospital ward (P=0.004) which students older than 30, medical research fellows and students working in the surgery and pathology wards experience needle stick injuries more than others significantly. Conclusion: This study showed the high incidence of needle stick injuries in medical students and highlighted the need for implementing precise interventions.