Abstract 127: Awareness and practices of disposing sharps used in the care of diabetes mellitus

Background: Management of diabetes needs regular blood tests and insulin injections. Various kinds of medical instruments like insulin pens, needles, syringes, lancets etc are used as part of self-care. While sharp disposal is strictly regulated in most hospital settings, this is not the case in community. Objective: To assess the awareness and practices regarding the disposal of sharps among diabetic patients. Methods: Over 3-month period diabetic patients were interviewed regarding sharps disposal, using a structured questionnaire. Assuming 95%lack of awareness, 20% relative precision, 5% type 1 error, sample size calculated was 456. Descriptive statistics were used. Results: There were a total of 479 patients, with 252 (52.61) women. There were 303 (63.25%) patients on insulin and 98 (32.34%) of them used pen devices. Mean age was 60.4 ± 11.5 and mean duration of diabetes was 13.5 ± 8.9 years. Mean HbA1c was 9.3 ± 2.1%. Most of our patients 437 (91.81%) were not aware of proper ways to dispose sharps. 359 (75.26) deposited in common household trash. 320 (66.81) eventually disposed in their backyard and 137 (29%) burned it. Conclusions: Inappropriate disposal of sharps pose risk not only to scavengers but also to our environment. It is necessary to educate our patients regarding sharps disposal. Policy makers should be made aware in order to establish facilities for proper disposal of such hazardous sharps in the community and implement the same.