Notes From the field: No thank you, I am not that thirsty
Recently I was in an office going over some safety issues. One of the staff members said she had a pot of coffee in their break room and asked if I would like a cup.
“Sure,” I said.
The nurse and I walked back to the break room. Sure enough the coffee was just about ready as it brewed in the coffee pot that was sitting next to the autoclave. There was also a towel laying on the sink with “cleaned” vaginal speculum awaiting a cycle in the autoclave.
As if that wasn’t bad enough, at the end of the counter, sitting on the floor, was a very large biohazard waste box completely filled with needle containers and biohazard waste.
I quickly turned down the offer of coffee stating I had really had enough caffeine. I envisioned tiny spore swimming in my coffee!
When I asked why the autoclave was in the kitchen area, I was told there was no where else to put it; the same went for the biohazard waste box.
Clearly, I had a compliance issue to deal with ASAP.
OSHA guidelines prohibit eating or drinking in an area that contains biohazard waste. I told the nurse from that moment on, no one could eat or drink in the break room until the autoclave and biohazard waste material were removed from the eating area.
Ultimately, the biohazard waste box was moved to the basement, since the door was off the kitchen area. A biohazard waste warning symbol has been placed on the door leading to the basement.
The nurses’ station was re-arranged and cleaned up to make room for the autoclave. The instrument pre-cleaning was assigned to a “dirty sink” area.
Obviously, an OSHA inspector, would take a dim view on autoclaving and storing biohazard waste in the area where the staff members are eating their lunches. This area should be free of any medical waste.
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Kathy Rooker
Kathy Rooker is the safety officer and owner of Columbus Healthcare & Safety Consultants, Canal Winchester, OH (krookerchsc@gmail.com or 614-833-9092). Rooker has more than 35 years experience working in the healthcare field and currently provides OSHA and CLIA consulting and inspections for physician practices and conducts OSHA annual training seminars in and around Central Ohio. In her "Notes from the Field" posts, she shares real life OSHA compliance issues and offers solutions to these sometimes complicated situations.
Kathy has written 19 posts.
Comments
Great topic, and an issue most of us probably have to deal with. We did a pictorial of the problems we found (some pretty ugly) with food and drink in areas it should not be. We showed the pictures to our large management meeting during a lunch meeting. It got the point across. We also have a policy that if a department gets an OSHA fine for a safety issue that they had total control over, they pay the fine.
This appears to be an issue that all of us may have. My biggest issue is finding food/beverages in the dirty utility room. We took pictures of the most blatent violators and showed them during a management luncheon. That got their attention. We also require a department to pay any potential OSHA fine for safety items that they have direct control over.
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