Factors Influencing Personal Sanitation and Hygiene Practices of Food handlers in Takhli Town Municipality, Nakhon Sawan Province
Keywords:
Food handlers, Personal sanitation and hygiene, Environmental conditions of food establishmentsAbstract
This study aimed to examine personal factors, predisposing, enabling, and reinforcing factors, and Personal Sanitation and Hygiene practices among food handlers, as well as to identify factors influencing such practices in Takhli Town Municipality, Nakhon Sawan Province. A total of 120 food handlers were selected as the sample. Data were collected using a structured questionnaire with reliability coefficients of 0.76 (KR-20) and 0.71 (Cronbach’s alpha). Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and stepwise multiple linear regression. The results showed that the majority of the sample were female (70%), with ages ranging between 40 and 60 years (51.56%). Most participants were married (49.2%), had primary school education (32.5%), earned 10,000–20,000 baht per month (64%), and had an average work experience of 11.30 years. Regarding key variables, 39.2% had a high level of knowledge, 65.8% had positive attitudes, and 73.3% reported good environmental conditions of food establishments. However, 68.3% had never received sanitation training, and 85% had never received sanitation-related awards. Overall, 42.5% demonstrated good Personal Sanitation and Hygiene practices. The factors significantly influencing Personal Sanitation and Hygiene practices were enabling factors, specifically environmental conditions of food establishments (B = 2.13, p<0.001), and reinforcing factors, particularly sanitation training (B = 5.20, p< 0.001). These variables jointly explained 86.2% of the variance in practices.
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