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Needlestick
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This document provides general information only. For more information
on these topics and others please follow the resource links
at the bottom of each information page. If you have specific
questions about diseases and conditions, please refer them to
a licensed physician.
This page includes background information about needlestick
including articles on needlestick injuries, needlestick links
and some frequently asked questions about
needlestick injuries.
Download posters for your workplace.
Articles
Needlestick injuries can be reduced, unions say
Ontario workers endorse immediate action to
stop needlestick injuries!
NIOSH recommendations
Needlestick injuries can be reduced,
unions say
CTV.ca News Staff
Health care workers say that many needlestick accidents, which
can potentially spread blood-borne diseases like HIV and hepatitis,
could be prevented with safety engineered needles.
Just last month Joanne Brown, a St. Catharines nurse, got the
scare of her life. She got poked with an IV needle, and immediately
had to be tested for HIV, and hepatitis B and C. Brown's tests
have so far come back negative, but she'll face more testing
in the years to come.
This is a scare that 70,000 Canadian health care workers face
each year. It's not just nurses and doctors in danger -- even
laundry workers have been injured by carelessly discarded needles.
Unions representing health care workers are starting a province
by province campaign, to make it law that only safety engineered
needles are used in hospitals or by emergency medical teams.
These needles, which reduce the chance for human error, have
a feature in which, when the plunger goes down, the needle automatically
retracts. Studies show that the use of such devices cut the
risk of a needlestick injury by up to 90 per cent.
"We don't need any more studies now," says Ted Mansel of the
Service Employees International Union. "We need a law that protects
people from these injuries."
In the United States, 24 states require safety engineered needles.
Cost is an issues for health care providers. Safety engineered
needles are more expensive. But at the St. Catharines General
Hospital where Joanne Brown workers, even the partial introduction
of these needles has cut needlestick injuries by 75 per cent.
And the cost of doing nothing could ultimately be far more expensive.
A former Montreal dermatologist is suing the McGill University
Health Centre for $1 million after he contract AIDS through
a needlestick injury in 1997.
In his claim, the doctor says he tried to throw the needle into
the "sharps" basket, but because the basket was full, the needle
bounced back and pricked his left thumb.
"The cost of life is far more important than what they have
to worry about financially," Brown says.
Ontario workers endorse immediate
action to stop needlestick injuries!
Delegates to the Ontario Federation of Labour passed the following
resolution, launching the Ontario campaign to prevent deadly
injuries from needlesticks and medical devices.
The more than 1,000 delegates to the Ontario Federation of Labour
convention passed the following resolution:
Submitted by Service Employees International Union Canada (SEIU)
WHEREAS an estimated 70,000 workers across Canada, including
more than 21,000 in Ontario, suffer injuries from needlesticks
and medical sharps devices each year and are at dangerous risk
of exposure to as many as 33 serious and even fatal bloodborne
infections including Hepatitis B, C and HIV, and
WHEREAS studies determine the use of safety-engineered medical
devices can prevent more than 80% of these devastating injuries,
and
WHEREAS the United States recognized the absolute necessity
and proven effectiveness of preventing this deadly hazard by
enacting the Needlestick Safety and Prevention Act, mandating
the use of engineering controls to eliminate or minimize employee
exposure to bloodborne pathogens,
THEREFORE IT BE RESOLVED the Ontario Federation of Labour launch
an urgent and aggressive campaign utilizing all available resources
for an effective and enforceable "Needlestick and Sharps" Regulation
mandating the use of engineering controls including safety-engineered
needles and sharps medical devices in all Ontario workplaces.
Passed November 25, 2003 Source: Service Employees International
Union (SEIU)
NIOSH recommendations
NIOSH recommends that health care facilities use safer medical
devices to protect workers from needlestick and other sharps
injuries. Since the passage of the Needlestick Safety and Prevention
Act in 2000 and the subsequent revision of the OSHA Bloodborne
Pathogen Standard, all health care facilities are required to
use safer medical devices.
To assist health care facilities that are working through this
process, NIOSH has asked a small number of health care facilities
to share their experiences on how they implemented safer medical
devices in their settings. These facilities have agreed to describe
how each step was accomplished, and also to discuss the barriers
they encountered and how they resolved, and most importantly,
lessons learned.
To maintain confidentiality, we removed all corporate or personal
identifiers from their submissions. The health care facilities
are located in 4 major cities in the United States that were
selected because the AIDS rates for those cities were above
the national and state averages.
The health care facilities will be following the process as
described in the NIOSH publication, Alert:
Preventing Needlestick Injuries in Health Care Settings.
Read the healthcare facility reports for each step.
- Form a sharps injury prevention team
- Identify priorities
- Identify and screen safer medical devices
- Evaluate safer medical device(s)
- Implement and monitor the use of the new safer medical
device
Source: Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention
FAQ
Q. Who is at risk of needlestick injury?
A. Any worker who may come in contact with needles is at risk,
including nursing staff, lab workers, doctors and housekeepers.
Q. What kinds of needles usually cause needlestick injuries?
A. Hypodermic needles, blood collection needles, suture needles
and needles used in IV delivery systems.
Q. What infections can be caused by needlestick injuries?
A. Needlestick injuries can expose workers to a number of bloodborne
pathogens that can cause serious or fatal infections. The pathogens
that pose the most serious risks are: Hepatitis B virus (HBV)
Hepatitis C virus (HCV) Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) -
the virus that causes AIDS
Links
Health Canada
Surveillance
of healthcare workers exposed to blood/body fluids and bloodborne
pathogens
Canadian
Centre for Occupational Health and Safety
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