Occupational exposures to needle stick injuries among health care staff; a review study

Introduction: Infectious diseases have threatened human health throughout the history. One way of transmission of such diseases is exposing to the needle sticks. The present study was carried out aiming to introduce and investigate risk factors related to needle sticks and ways of prevention of infectious diseases related to needle stick among health care staff. Methods: Searching key words including needle sticks, occupational injuries, occupational exposures (OEs) and infectious diseases, the researchers undertook a comprehensive investigation regardless of publication year of the reviewed articles in references including, Medline, CINAHL, Google Scholar, ScienceDirect and Scopus. Then the collected articles were scrutinized and processed. Results: Dealing with needle sticks can transmit more than 20 types of pathogens including Hepatitis B, C and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Among health care staff, nurses are more vulnerable compared to others. Conclusion: Exposure to blood and other risky body liquids is a serious risk factor among health care workers. Training medical staff, establishing reporting systems, changing high risk behaviors and vaccination can play an important role in prevention of the infectious diseases.