| dc.description.abstract | Health-care waste in health facilities should be segregated accurately and generation rates established. The data so obtained supports the management of health-care waste in institutions by putting in place waste minimization strategies, reduce management costs and help monitoring possible public health threats and environmental pollution it may pose. This study was done in two Teaching and Referral hospitals, Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH), Nairobi and Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital (MTRH), Eldoret. Four categories of hazardous health-care waste, infectious, pathological, sharps and chemical waste were weighed for seven (7) consecutive days during the dry and wet season to find out if generation rates were affected by seasonal changes. The coefficient of variation derived from the data for the wet and dry season revealed that there was no significant difference in generation of infectious, pathological, and sharps waste during the two seasons at KNH. At MTRH, there was also no significant difference in generation rates during the wet and dry season for infectious, and Sharps waste. The coefficient of variation for pathological waste generation was however significant for the institution. The coefficient of variation for MTRH and MTRH was significantly different for infectious waste (p=0.0000) but pathological (p=0.7393) and sharps (p=0.3363) were not significant. During the dry season the coefficient of variation was significantly different for infectious waste (p=0.0027) and pathological waste (p=0.0086). The sharps waste generation coefficient of variation was not significant (p=0.3615). There was no comparison done for chemical waste because the daily consumption in a week was illegular. The hazardous health-care waste generation (based on the four studied waste categories) was found to be 0.61 kg/bed/day for KNH and 1.03 kg/bed/day. Health-care waste was not accurately segregated in the two National Referral Hospital. The two institutions should establish health-care waste minimisation programme and maintain an up to date waste generation rates record in categories to support planning. | en_US |
