A survey on the Tuberculin test results of hospital staff in Hamadan Medical Sciences University

Contraversies have been reported in recent studies regarding the risk of T.B contamination for hospital personnel. Some of the experts consider all of the hospital staff in high risk groups while others consider the risk only for hospital staff working in the wards in which T.B patients are hospitalized. Therefore in this study tuberculin test results of hospital clinical staff was compared to that of the administrative staff. In multistage cluster sampling a total of 269 clinical staff and 270 administrative staff were injected with PPD. After 48 hours muscle spasm was determined. No significant difference was observed regarding age, family history of tuberculosis, or a BCG scar in the two groups. The rate of T.B infection was higher in clinical staff compared to that of the administrative personnel (54.27% compared to the 32.71% in administrative staff). Among the clinical staff the rate of positive PPD test was higher in people who worked 6 months or longer in the infectious diseases wards compared to the people who worked less than 6 months in the same ward, or not worked at all. This study emphasizes the need for offering education programs for hospital personnel.