This study was undertaken to assess the effect of peer led educational intervention programs on the occupational risk prevention practices among the medical waste handlers in some selected tertiary hospitals in South west, Nigeria. The specific objectives were to determine the baseline occupational risk prevention practices among the participants; and assess the effect of peer- led educational intervention on the occupational risk prevention practices at 12th week post intervention follow up among the participants. The study was an interventional study and adopted a two group quasi-experimental design. Participants of the study were the hospital attendants that served as medical waste handlers working at Olabisi Onabanjo University Teaching Hospital, Sagamu and Federal Medical Centre, Ebute Meta, Lagos. The instrument for the study was a structured questionnaire developed to determine the baseline assessment and outcome evaluation of the intervention. Data collected were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics. The findings of the study revealed that the mean score of risk prevention practices at 12th week post intervention for control group is 11.12±3.20 while the experimental group is 17.32±4.78 with mean difference of 6.20 in favour of the experimental group. The study concludes that peer led educational intervention programs was effective in improving risk prevention practices among the medical waste handlers. It was recommended among others that major stakeholders in the ministry of health and health institutions should adopt peer led education in the training of the medical waste handlers.
Keywords: Practices, medical waste handlers, occupational risk prevention, peer-led education
