Publication:

Hand hygiene in food handlers working in canteens of an educational institution in Eastern India

Background Food borne diseases are a worldwide problem of great magnitude in terms of human sufferings and economic cause. One of the important category directly relating to food safety concerns are the food handlers. This study was conducted to assess the knowledge and self-reported food safety practices of food handlers regarding food safety and hand hygiene and bacteriological analysis of hand hygiene of food handlers working in the canteen.

Methods The demographic data was collected on a structured questionnaire and the hand swabs were cultures as per standard protocol.

Results The study was conducted on 29 food handlers and 93.1% were males. A positive correlation was observed between the variables ‘knowledge’ and ‘self-reported food safety practices of food handlers with the socio-demographic data. The association between detection of different microorganisms and different knowledge and practices were a significant finding in 95% confidence limit (p<0.001) on applying two tailed Z-test.

Conclusions This study is exploratory in nature and can act as a base study of the relationship between hand sanitation and knowledge attitude and practice of food handlers.