Sunday, February 23, 2014

OSHA & Healthcare Associated Infections?


February  23, 2014

Jorge Palacios

California Department of Public Health (CDPH-CHCQ-HAI)

Re: "Database of Best Practices for the Prevention of Healthcare Associated infections" according to

         OSHA

 

Dear Mr. Palacios,

 Once again, please allow me to thank you and the entire staff at the California Department of Public Health for your efforts concerning patient safety, I really appreciate it.

 The concept of a “Database of Best Practices for the prevention of Healthcare Associated Infections(HAI)” is now in stone:

 


 Who knew the U. S. Department of Labor and the good work of the American Association of Critical- Care Nurses(AACCN) would dramatically improve patient and healthcare efficiency and safety in our state by defining HAI as a workplace safety issue.

 More than likely OSHA has no idea what they have done and the CDPH has no choice but to adapt “best practices for the prevention of HAI” or risk becoming irrelevant in HAI prevention.

 These ”best practices” should be based on evidence based medicine, introduces to all teaching schools in California as mandatory training and should be monitored by the current monitoring for opportunities for improvement in addition to being made available to be challenged world-wide.

 Advantages, the burden of every “silo “ creating their own “best practices” is a tremendous and unnecessary burden traditionally producing marginal gains only to be lost with turnover and marketplace changes.

 The words “best practices” will force the US Department of Health and Human Services(USDHHS) to adapt them, currently they are awaiting and sometimes funding “best practices” to be developed at  the state level, California has been avoiding calling anything a “best practice” for far too long and thousands of lives have been needlessly lost and billions in fiscal waste from a very dysfunctional plan of action are well documented.

 How do our Veteran’s gain from the posting of “best practices”, the US Veterans Affairs are waiting for the USDHHS to deliver “best practices for the Prevention of HAI” and have been for the past few years according to my research.

 The value of standardized processes delivered by empowered healthcare staff members assuming a leadership role, up, down, 360 degrees around has proven to be able to combat HAI and the CDPH should demand nothing less from all healthcare facilities in California, perhaps the “bright future” of healthcare.

 The interesting part of OSHA getting involved, you usually do not see OSHA in your facility until a life is lost, this is going to be very interesting but their resources are limited and I would appreciate the CDPH HAI program to make your “Database of Best Practices for the Prevention of HAI” available to OSAHA to give them a head start and direction as to where best invest their resources. Needless to say, I will be sending the Honorable President of the United States a warm thank you as a very much appreciated investment in improving the safety and efficiencies of healthcare.

Once again, thank you and the entire staff at the C.D.P.H. for all that you do concerning patient safety.

Sincerely,

Michael H. Slavinski                                http://h-a-i-5.blogspot.com





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