• Wei-Qing Chen, Wen-Hua Ling, Ci-Yong Lu, Yuan-Tao Hao, Zhong-Ning Lin, Li Ling, Jian Huang, Gang Li, and Guang-Mei Yan.
• Department of Biostatistics and Epidemiology, School of Public Health, Sun Yat-Sen University, 74 Zhongshan Road II, Guangzhou, PR China. chenwq@mail.sysu.edu.cn
• Bmc Public Health. 2009 Mar 13; 9: 81.

BackgroundDespite the use of a series of preventive measures, a high incidence of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) was observed among health care workers (HCWs) during the SARS epidemic. This study aimed to determine which preventive measures may have been effective in protecting HCWs from infection, and which were not effective.MethodsA retrospective study was performed among 758 'frontline' health care workers who cared for SARS patients at the Second Affiliated Hospital and the Third Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University. The HCWs with IgG against SARS and those without IgG against SARS were respectively defined as the "case group" and the "control group", and logistic regression was conducted to explore the risk factors for SARS infection in HCWs.ResultsAfter adjusting for age, gender, marital status, educational level, professional title, and the department in which an individual worked, the results of a multivariate logistic regression analysis indicated that incidence of SARS among HCWs was significantly and positively associated with: performing tracheal intubations for SARS patients, methods used for air ventilation in wards, avoiding face-to-face interaction with SARS patients, the number of pairs of gloves worn by HCWs, and caring for serious SARS cases.ConclusionSome measures, particularly good air ventilation in SARS wards, may be effective in minimizing or preventing SARS transmission among HCWs in hospitals.

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