OSHA gives more time to comply with safe needles
Enforcement of revised standard begins July 17
Hospitals have gained some extra time to comply with the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s (OSHA) revised bloodborne pathogens standard. As OSHA geared up an education and outreach effort, the agency announced that enforcement of the rule would begin July 17, 2001. States and U.S. territories with OSHA-approved state programs are required to adopt the revisions or more stringent requirements by Oct. 18.
OSHA has provided its educational materials on the revisions on its web site: www.osha.gov. Packets that could be used in training seminars are available from OSHA education centers. (See editor’s note at the end of this article.) This is OSHA’s summary of the new definitions and requirements in the rule:
• Two new definitions are included in the revision, while one existing term is amended:
— Sharps with Engineered Sharps Injury Protections include non-needle sharps or needle devices used for withdrawing fluids or administering medications or other fluids that contain built-in safety features, or mechanisms that effectively reduce the risk of an exposure incident.
— Needleless Systems are devices that do not use needles for the collection or withdrawal of body fluids, or for the administration of medication or fluids.
— Engineering Controls include all control measures that isolate or remove a bloodborne pathogen hazard from the workplace. The revision now specifies that "self-sheathing needles" and "safer medical devices, such as sharps with engineered sharps injury protections and needleless systems" are engineering controls.
• Employers must review their exposure control plans annually to reflect changes in technology that will help eliminate or reduce exposure to bloodborne pathogens.
That review must include documentation of the employer’s consideration and implementation of appropriate commercially available and effective safer devices.
• Employers must solicit input from non-managerial health care workers regarding the identification, evaluation, and selection of effective engineering controls, including safer medical devices.
Examples of employees include those in different departments of the facility (e.g., geriatric, pediatric, nuclear medicine, etc.).
• Employers with 11 or more employees who are required to keep records by current record keeping standards, must maintain a sharps injury log. The log must be maintained in a way to ensure employee privacy and will contain, at the minimum, the following information:
— type and brand of device involved in the incident, if known;
— location of the incident;
— description of the incident.
[Editor’s note: Educational materials on the revised bloodborne pathogens standard are available from the OSHA web site (www.osha.gov). For more information about the revised standard, contact bloodborne pathogens coordinators in the OSHA regional offices.]
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