Handling Health Care Waste Management and gender differences inudthe Madinah Primary Healthcare Centers, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

摘要

Health care waste management (HCWM) is a major challenge in developing countries. Poor HCWM will exacerbateudthe risk of infection. HCW segregation is considered the most important step of health care waste managementud(HCWM). This article attempts to analyze and evaluate gender differences in their perception of HCW segregationudat the Madinah primary health care centers (PHCC) in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (K.S.A.). Questionnaireudsurveys were conducted to gather primary data from 925 respondents (230 females and 225 males) at variousudPHCCs in Madinah. Data were then analyzed using the SPSS and PLS-smart 2.0. In general, female respondentsudhad higher qualifications and income, and longer working experience than males. About 80% of the departmentsudmanaged by females had the correct type of container compared to the males’ 42%. The study also found that theudwaste segregation at the PHCCs was poor as it was not achieved at 34.1% of all the departments. Similarly, theudresults of the hypothesis tests showed that waste segregation in PHCC did not have a direct relationship withudHCWM (0.0001; t = 0. 0015) just as there were no direct relationships between waste segregation of males andudfemales with HCWM ( 0.0565; t=1.3669).