Avaliação do risco de exposição dos profissionais de saúde e o uso de equipamentos de proteção individual no contexto de COVID-19

Abstract

Introduction: covid-19 is a disease caused by the coronavirus, which in March 2020 led the World Health Organization (WHO) to declare a pandemic. In this sense, health professionals have been exposed to the virus, requiring biosafety measures. Objectives: to analyze the risk of exposure among professionals and assess the prevalence ratio of the risk of exposure by personal and professional characteristics and types of services within the context of the covid-19 pandemic in the state of Minas Gerais. Methods This is a cross-sectional study carried out in Minas Gerais from November 2020 to June 2021. The participants were health professionals reached through social media dissemination strategies, with remote data collection. The instrument "Risk assessment and exposure management of health professionals in the context of COVID-19" was used for data collection. The data was analyzed by absolute frequency, percentage and measures of central tendency. Pearson's chi-square test was implemented for the variables gender, type of healthcare facility, professional category, multiple patients with COVID-19 in the healthcare facility and the dependent variable was the risk of exposure. In order to estimate the association between exposure and outcome, the prevalence ratio - PR - was applied. Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 29 was used for statistical treatment. Results: 341 health professionals took part, the majority of whom were physiotherapists 45.2% (n=154), followed by nurses 31.7% (n=108), 16.7% nursing technicians and assistants (n=57) and 6.5% doctors (n=22). Regarding the risk of occupational exposure, 73.0% (n=249) were at high risk. A relationship was found between the high risk of exposure to Covid-19 and the age of professionals between 35 and 51 years (U=9421.000, p=0.025; weak effect size= 0.1217). Outpatient workers had a 65% lower prevalence of risk of exposure when compared to other work environments (p = 0.013). No association could be found between the risk of exposure and personal or professional characteristics or other types of health service. Conclusions: health professionals had a high risk of exposure to the virus 73.0% (n=247), working in outpatient clinics had a 65% lower prevalence of risk of exposure. There was no significant association between the risk of exposure and personal and professional characteristics and other types of health service.