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Safety Precautions and Operating Procedures in an (A)BSL-4 Laboratory: 2. General Practices
Published on: October 3, 2016
Survey of nursing knowledge on bioterrorism
M De Felice1, A R Giuliani, G Alfonsi
1Department of Internal Medicine and Public Health, University of L'Aquila, Italy.
Abstract:
With the aim of identifying intervention programmes within the framework of basic and permanent nursing training, we evaluated the knowledge of 187 nurses and nursing students concerning biological emergencies. A questionnaire was used to identify their knowledge of the pathogens that may be used in a terrorist attack and measures for containing them, and their perception of the danger to public health. Analysis of the responses showed that the undergraduates studying for the Triennial Degree were the best informed, and those studying for the specialist degree were the least informed. The question relating to the precautions adopted against transmission of Bacillus anthracis was the most predictive of the total score because it was the only one with a substantial number of correct answers (79/187). It seems that the information derived more from the generalist media than from academic training. We conclude that there is a need to train qualified personnel capable of responding to a possible emergency in terms of both preventive and interventional medicine.
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