Fungal Pollution of Indoor Air of Some Health Facilities in Rivers State

Aims: Investigating the fungal pollution within the indoor air of two government health facilities.

Study Design: The study sites (wards) were the four most used wards. One hundred and ninety-two air samples were collected in two sampling periods (morning and evening).

Place and Duration of Study: Samples were collected from four study sites (wards) each of two different primary Health centres; the Orowurukwo Primary Health centre and the Rumuigbo Primary Health centre. The GPS of these areas are 4.806°N, 6.992°E and 4.850°N, 6.991°E respectively. The study sites were the postnatal, children, injection and outpatient wards. This was a three months study (January-March).

Methodology: The plate exposure technique was used in the collection of air samples. Freshly prepared Sabouraud Dextrose agar plates in duplicates were left open above one meter in the various study sites for 15 minutes. Collected samples were transferred to the Microbiological Laboratory and incubated at 20-25°C for 3-7 days. After incubation, fungal populations were enumerated and distinct isolates were purified by subculturing onto fresh SDA plates. The purified isolates were used for characterization.

Results: Five fungal genera which include Aspergillus, Candida, Penicillium, Rhizopus, and Mucor species were isolated and identified. The fungal loads in log10sfu/m3 ranged from 2.42 to 2.51 and 2.23 to 2.55 for morning and evening sampling hour in the Oroworukwo Health centre respectively. While those of the Rumuigbo ranged from 2.23-2.39 and 2.37-2.50 in the morning and evening sampling hours respectively. The statistical insignificant difference was reported in the sfu/m3 of the two sampling hours at P=0.05.

Conclusion: The fungal load in this study was very high when compared with other studies. Also, the species of fungi in this study are pathogenic and could cause delay recovery especially in immuno-compromised patients.