Employee health and infection control professionals have made a lot of progress in reducing the risk of needlesticks that could lead to infections with bloodborne viruses like HCV. However, the problem is still beset by a “gap in knowledge,” says…
Category Archives: Health Care Workers
Health care worker group tracking national needlestick trends, lobbying for rapid testing of source patients
May 6, 2013 – 8:56 am
Low-risk hospitals reduce TB screening, but should remain vigilant
April 1, 2013 – 9:24 pm
Hospitals that have reduced tuberculosis screening for health care workers should remain vigilant for disease introductions and take heed of the following cautionary tale. In 2005, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued guidelines that advised health care facilities…
Researchers seek a more comfortable, breathable health care respirator
March 26, 2013 – 7:46 am
Compliance with respirator use for the next emerging airborne infection or pandemic would likely improve if health care workers could literally breathe easier. A better respirator designed specifically for health care workers is on the horizon. Manufacturers are working with…
Hand washing, gloving contribute to high rates of dermatitis in health care workers
March 17, 2013 – 7:01 pm
Health care workers may be suffering in silence from work-related dermatitis, much of it linked to frequent hand washing. Cases of work-related dermatitis are about 100 times greater than the rate reflected in federal data, and health care workers are…
Fed employment commission says “sincere religious belief” can be cited as an exemption to flu shot mandates
March 13, 2013 – 8:48 am
Hospitals can get an immediate boost in health care worker vaccination coverage with mandatory influenza immunization policies. But before implementing a mandate, employers must answer an important question: Who will get an exemption? A mandate without exemptions is a legal…
Hospital employee health professionals find they must do more with less
December 10, 2012 – 9:53 am
Hospital adminstrators may have a growing appreciation of the expanding role of their employee health professionals, but salary compensation and program resources are still lagging, according to a special report in the January 2013 issue of our sister publication, Hospital Employee Health….
Joint Commission: You can’t have patient safety without health care worker safety
November 27, 2012 – 9:38 am
The silos that separate patient safety and worker safety are coming down. Preventing medical errors and protecting health care workers are part of the same continuum, The Joint Commission accrediting body asserts in a new monograph. For employee health professionals,…
CIDRAP: CDC puts ‘trust’ at risk on flu vaccine
November 26, 2012 – 9:44 am
Bring science back into the discussion of influenza vaccination. That is the essential message of a controversial report on flu vaccination by the Center for Infectious Disease Research & Policy (CIDRAP) at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. While…
CDC: Flexibility will remain on hepatitis B immunizations for health care workers
November 5, 2012 – 12:01 am
Flexibility will be the guiding principle in upcoming recommendations on health care workers who were vaccinated against hepatitis B as infants. Instead of directing hospitals to test all young health care workers for antibodies to hepatitis B surface antigen, the…
Fatal infection in lab worker remains a mystery
September 25, 2012 – 9:52 pm
No specific infection control breach has been identified in the death earlier this year of a 25-year-old research laboratory associate at the VA Medical Center in San Francisco. Richard Din was working on a project to develop a vaccine against…