JOURNAL OF CLINICAL AND BIOMEDICAL SCIENCES

Abstract

Background: The theme for the World Rabies Day 2016 is ‘Educate Vaccinate Eliminate’. Rabies is a disease with 100% mortality which can be prevented if timely measures are taken. The first point of con-tact for the public are usually the government health care facilities where anti-rabies vaccine and rabies immunoglobulin (RIG) are provided free of cost. Aim: To assess the knowledge and practice of administra-tion of RIG among the staff nurses working in primary and secondary level health care centres of a health unit district. Materials and Methods: A facility based cross sectional study was carried out among 43 staff nurses working in community health centres and taluk and district level hospitals using a self-administered questionnaire. Results: Among the 43 respondents 20.9% had adequate knowledge on categorization of bite wounds 79% on mode of transmission and 60.5% on the dosage of RIG. Around 76.7% were aware of the method of administration of the immunoglobulin. Also 58.1% of them managed category 3 bite in their own health facility and 44.4% referred the patients for management to other centres to avoid untoward incidents, 5.5% referred the patients as they did not know how to administer and 50% of them referred due to unavailability of the immunoglobulin in their facility. Conclusion: The training to administer RIG has to be implemented to the nurses in the health centres so as to bridge the existing gaps in the knowledge and practices and also managerial steps are to be taken to ensure uninterrupted supply of the RIG.

Keywords: Rabies Immunoglobulin, Nurse, category 3 animal bites