Hospital Employee Health – October 1, 2012
October 1, 2012
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Underreporting puts HCWs at risk of the unknown
Hospital workers are far more likely than employees in any other industry to develop an occupational illness. In 2010, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics logged about 17,000 such illnesses in hospitals. Yet safety experts say its still just the tip of the iceberg. No one knows just how big that iceberg is. -
Failure to report has life-threatening result
Lack of reporting of infectious disease exposures may also result in a lack of treatment. And that can have serious, even deadly, consequences. -
Pertussis surges, but HCW vaccination lags
As the nation faces the largest outbreak of pertussis in 50 years, the rate of vaccination of health care workers languishes at about 20%. -
Sharpen focus on TB blood tests
Using a blood test to screen health care workers for tuberculosis can cut your false positives by two-thirds, but it is critical to evaluate the numerical result on the test, according to members of a national TB testing task force. -
Do childhood vaccines protect young HCWs?
In the age of safer needles, vaccination and prophylaxis, the risk of hepatitis B among health care workers has dropped dramatically, from a high of about 12,000 cases a year in the 1980s to 203 reported acute cases from 2005 to 2010. Routine HBV vaccination of infants, which began in 1991, promises to make transmission from blood and body fluid exposures even rarer. -
‘Serial infector’ charged for HCV spread
It began as an infection control nightmare in New Hampshire, but it didnt stop there. A medical technician who worked in the cardiac catheterization lab in Exeter Hospital in Nashua was charged with diverting drugs and reusing the syringes on patients. -
CMS: Avoid outbreaks with infection control
A mid some high-profile outbreaks of hepatitis C, the Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has put health care facilities on notice that inspectors will zero in on infection control practices and observe the practices of health care workers.1