TITLE:
Supply and Human Resource-Related Factors in COVID-19 Preparedness within Dental Facilities in Nairobi County, Kenya
AUTHORS:
Hazel Chematia, Simon Karanja, Elizabeth Kiilu
KEYWORDS:
COVID-19, Preparedness, Supplies, Human Resources, Kenya
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Epidemiology,
Vol.15 No.2,
May
15,
2025
ABSTRACT: Dental care health professionals are among the highly impact groups because of the nature of their work. Dental professionals must have adequate resources, including appropriate protective procedures to minimize and prevent disease spread. Supplies and human resources ensure dental facilities have the necessary personal protective equipment (PPE) to provide safe oral care and staffing adequacy to support patients’ care needs. Following the border lockdown, the disrupted global supply chain created a global shortage of reagents, PPEs, and testing kits. In Kenya, inadequate expertise among staff, delayed disbursements, and biased priorities affected preparedness levels to deal with COVID-19. This study aimed to determine the supplies and human resource-related factors affecting preparedness in COVID-19 pandemic management among dental facilities in Nairobi County, Kenya. The study was an analytical cross-sectional study targeting dental care professionals from the 257 public, private, and faith-based dental facilities in Nairobi County. Data from 183 facilities was obtained with 21.3% categorized as “fully prepared” for the COVID-19 pandemic. Over 90% of the dental facilities had temperature measuring tools, 96.7% had sanitizers and alcohol rubs, 96.2% had handwashing points with soap and running water available, 100% had face masks and gloves, 80.9% had gowns, 86.9% had goggles or face shield, and 97.3% had disinfectant. The number of staff in the dental facilities was between 4 and 14 team members, with 44.8% having 0-5 health workers. Seventy-six percent of the facilities had IPC guidelines, 81.4% had staff training on IPC protocols related to COVID-19 emergency preparedness, and 90.7% did additional cleaning or sanitization of work areas and offices. In conclusion, most dental facilities in Nairobi County were only fully prepared to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic. There were gaps in the availability of supplies and human resources to support the pandemic as none of the supplies-related or human resource-related factors were fully available. Only PPE inventory as a supplies-related factor had a significant association with COVID-19 preparedness.