Saeed Khan, Fatin Zehra, Noorulaine Maqsood, Maria Zahid, Bilal Ahmed.
Biosafety Practices in Different Clinical Laboratories in Karachi, Pakistan.
J Dow Uni Health Sci Jan ;8(3):94-7.

Introduction: In Pakistan the number of diagnostic and research laboratories is increasing in both public and private sectors but there is still a lack of awareness regarding biosafety practices among the lab employees. These employees can be technicians, technologists, researchers or even keeping staff who gets exposed directly or indirectly to a plethora of pathogens daily. The need is to spread awareness regarding the importance of fundamental biosafety practices. Objective:To determine and compare the level of awareness and implementation regarding biosafety practices among different laboratories and their workers in Karachi, Pakistan. Methodology: A survey was conducted from 10 different diagnostic laboratories of Karachi, participants were interviewed and made to fill out a questionnare. Result: In the category of general safety 60% confirmed that they receive a formal biosafety training. 20% of the participants received a safety handbook. Usage of personal protective equipments were 80%.however 10% labs provide eye station and emergency shower facilitiy and 60% of the participants confirmed that fire station was not available in their lab. In the category of equipments, 80% of the participants agreed that their equipments were in working order, 60%of the participants confirmed that the PPM of their equipments were carried out on regular basis and Back up cold storage was available in only 20% of the laboratories. 40% of the participants said that the maintenance of biosafety cabinets was carried out regularly in their laboratories and only 40% were unaware regarding the certification of their biosafety cabinets. Whereas Proper disinfection and decontamination of biosafety cabinets was carried out in 70% of the cases. Conclusion: The outcome of our survey confirms a lack of practice and implementation of good biosafety practices in the clinical laboratories.

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