Bacterial Contaminants of Office Door Handles in Benue State University Makurdi

Abstract

Peter Sesugh Adaaku, Diana Adar Dabo, Musa Nanre Naomi, Kyarshik Angela Silvanus, Maqual George Esther

Public offices usually have large traffic of users who throng in with their own microbial flora and other organisms they have picked elsewhere and deposit them on door handles/knobs while going into and on their way out. Various bacteria have been isolated from public surfaces there by providing information on the relative hygiene of commonly encountered public surface, identifying the environments with contaminants and risk of exposures. The aim of this paper therefore is to identify the bacterial contaminants of office door handles in Benue State University Makurdi. Results from the research show an overall bacterial contamination rate of 82.5% (189/240). The highest occurrence of bacteria in this research was Staphylococcus aureus (40.90%), while the least was Salmonella species (6.06%). Other bacterial species isolated in this research included Escherichia coli, Klebsiella species and Salmonella species. Bacterial contamination varies across locations with faculty of sciences having the highest occurrence of bacteria species (47.97%) while the faculty of environmental sciences had the least occurrence (22.22%). The rate of bacterial contamination of the handles is high considering the harm these bacteria cause to the human species. It is therefore recommended that hand washing facilities be installed and used to mitigate the effects of these organisms on humans. Also, door handles be wiped consistently with disinfectants to reduce risk of contamination by bacteria.