DOI: 10.36347/sjams.2014.v02i05.048

Pages: 1727-1733

The objective of this study is evaluate the knowledge and awareness of our healthcare providers regarding major types of blast injuries and their attitudes and practices while dealing with blast injury patients in Karachi, Pakistan. A cross-sectional survey was conducted at three major government hospitals (Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Center, Civil Hospital Karachi and Abbasi Shaheed Hospital, Karachi) from August 2013 to January 2014. Our target population for the survey included a total of 102 Surgical Postgraduate trainees and house officers (Interns) of the above said hospitals which were recruited using purposive non-probability sampling technique. A self-constructed questionnaire was prepared by the researchers and administered to the target population. The data was analyzed using SPSS 16.0. The variables were cross-tabulated to identify possible relationships. Out of total of 102, 50% of the data was collected from civil hospital Karachi, 51% of those were house officers, belonged under the age group of less or equal 25 years, and 75.5% were females with unmarried proportion of 66.7% of total. It was found that a total of 46 respondents had attended the patients from blast injuries in past whereas 56 had never attended a patient with blast injuries. 15.22% cases who did attend patients from bomb blast scored zero on knowledge related questions, 2.18% cases got maximum score of 10, and 47.83 cases scored minimally which was one out of ten. There was positive association between, the above two groups, with awareness of injuries, attainment of training, and interest in participation of such training programs.