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Eleven years after Congress rescinded the ergonomics standard, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration is preparing to wield its "general duty clause" powers to identify ergonomic hazards in health care.
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Measles cases rose to their highest level in 15 years in 2011, yet another reminder to be on guard for the highly transmissible disease, public health authorities say.
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In a directive for compliance officers, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration lays out the key areas of an ergonomics program for health care employers. This is what inspectors will look for:
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Closely tracking infections among health care workers helps Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, TN, detect clusters and prevent further infections.
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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.
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As the nation faces the largest outbreak of pertussis in 50 years, the rate of vaccination of health care workers languishes at about 20%.
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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.
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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.
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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
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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.
