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Occupational Medicine 1999;49:448-450
© 1999 Society of Occupational Medicine

research-article

Hospital laundry workers — an at-risk group for hepatitis A?

M. A. Borg*, and A. Portelli{dagger}

* Infection Control Unit, St. Luke's Hospital Malta
{dagger} Dept of Pathology, University of Malta Medical School Malta

Twenty-two laundry personnel at St. Luke's Hospital, Malta, were tested for seropositivity to hepatitis A together with 37 nursing aides working in paediatric and infectious disease wards, matched for age, who were used as controls. lgG antibodies were found in 54.5% of laundry workers and 13.5% of nursing aides [odds ratio (OR) = 7.68; 95% confidence interval (Cl) = 1.87–33.83]. Furthermore, laundry personnel consistently handling dirty linen prior to washing showed an OR of 16.50 (Cl = 1.19–825.57) as compared with colleagues handling only clean items. These results would suggest that the increased exposure of hospital laundry workers to potentially infected linen can constitute a risk of occupational hepatitis A for this group of employees.

Keywords      Hepatitis A; hospital workers; laundry workers

Received        6 January 1999
Accepted        8 April 1999

Correspondence to: M. A. Borg, Infection Control Unit, St. Luke's Hospital Malta. Tel: (+356) 235448; Fax: (+356) 224286


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