KNOWLEDGE OF DOCTORS TOWARD THE STANDARD PRECAUTIONS AND PREVENTIVE MEASURES AGAINST CORONAVIRUS DISEASE (COVID-19), KHARTOUM, SUDAN 2020

INTRO: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused large numbers of morbidities and fatalities. Health care workers have greater risk of contracting the disease. This risk is even higher with sub-optimal adherence to prevention and control measures. This study assessed the knowledge of doctors in Khartoum state toward the standard precautions and protective methods against COVID-19. METHODS: A cross-sectional web-based study was conducted in 2020. The questionnaire was developed and the results were evaluated based on the Sudan Federal Ministry of Health and WHO guidelines on standard precautions needed against COVID-19 particularly use of personal protective equipment (PPE) and hand hygiene (HH) in hospital settings. FINDINGS: 165 doctors working in Khartoum State hospitals were included with a mean age of 27.5 +/- 4.1 years. Fifth of them dealt with COVID-19 patients, while 69.7% of them worked in an area where there is COVID-19 patients. The study revealed that most of the participants demonstrated an average level of knowledge 72% toward the needed PPE in all the situations. The weakest area was the knowledge regarding the equipment needed during the physical examination of patients with respiratory symptoms. Additionally, the vast majority had a poor level of knowledge regarding the right method of using PPE 81.8%. 82.9% of the participants showed poor knowledge toward HH practices. The study revealed that Those who had dealt with COVID-19 patients before, and those who received any form of training also had higher levels of knowledge p- value 0.017 and p-value 0.001, respectively. CONCLUSION: Overall, the participants had a poor level of knowledge toward the standard precautions. The level of knowledge significantly rises with experience and training.