While the facts of needlestick injury are now well established, it was a personal journey as a nurse in San Francisco in the 1980s that introduced me to the issues of bloodborne pathogens, occupational risk and prevention. As a staff nurse at Saint Francis Memorial Hospital in San Francisco, there was no way to know that we were one of the first hospitals to care for a patient infected with Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS). Ultimately for the health professionals, what was occurring each day was not just a CDC Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, but a life-threatening illness that put patients and workers at risk. Living through these events as a night shift nurse propelled my professional advocacy to protect staff from accidental injury and to provide safe, non-discriminatory care to patients in a national policy arena.
Initially, I worked with Dr. June Fisher to lead the campaign in California for the first state law in the U.S. to address safer product design. The California legislation was the first in a wave of state efforts to reduce accidental injury and to address safer medical device design.
I was elected President of the American Nurses Association in 2000 and was actively involved in the national efforts to amend the Federal OSHA laws to improve worker protection from sharps injury. I worked closely with infection control, hospital, union, and other safety advocates who collaborated to successfully guide the Needlestick Safety and Prevention Act of 2000 and, ten years ago this year, was honored to be in the White House when the legislation was signed by President Clinton.
While we should acknowledge there has been much accomplished in the last decade, there is more to be done. In the U.S., we know that workers continue to be injured in surgical, home care, and emergency settings, and even workers who are provided "safety" devices experience injuries. Globally, these issues and other challenges, remain in both developed and developing countries.
The SAFE IN COMMON community manifests my vision of a unified international effort to promote healthcare worker and patient safety in all settings, and in all countries. Working together - providers, employers, consumers, and manufacturers - I know we can make significant steps toward the universal delivery of safe and simple injections.
Mary Foley RN, MS, PhD
Past President, American Nurses Association
Associate Director, Center for Nursing Research and Innovation,
University of California, San Francisco
Comments
Post new comment