The Impact and Outcome of Training Programme of Health Care Workers with Reference to Sample Collection in Microbiology Laboratory

BACKGROUND Sample collection of blood, urine, stool, sputum and swab collection for various tests in a microbiology laboratory is a very important and crucial part of laboratory investigations. All samples should be properly labelled, and the requisition form should be filled properly. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of the training programme to improve the quality of sample collection in the microbiology laboratory. METHODS It is an observation based cross-sectional study which was conducted among the health care workers of a tertiary care hospital in Rajasthan to assess their knowledge regarding safe and proper sample collection and transportation. RESULTS In pre-session a lot of loopholes were found among the healthcare workers regarding proper sample collection techniques, handling of sample, transportation and storage of the sample, dealing with blood spillage and in general disinfection. After the orientation session, there was a significant increase in knowledge of how & when to take a sample that is 63 % & 54 % respectively which is almost more than double presession. CONCLUSIONS Proper sample collection and transportation are key steps to patient care and very useful for correct diagnosis. Most of the errors happen in the pre-analytical phase. In our study, we observed that the knowledge of participants improved significantly after continuous training sessions. This indicates that such a type of knowledge session is essential for improving sample collection practices. It is therefore important to train health care workers (HCW), who form the root of the health care system at regular intervals, to enhance knowledge significantly. KEY WORDS Sample Collection, Training, Laboratory, Sample Collection