Article Text

Download PDFPDF

0289  Preventing needlesticks and other sharps injuries to home care aides: results of a survey to identify hazards during home visits0289  Preventing needlesticks and other sharps injuries to home care aides: results of a survey to identify hazards during home visits
Free
  1. David Kriebel1,
  2. Natalie Brouillette1,
  3. Pia Markkanen1,
  4. Catherine Galligan1,
  5. Susan Sama1,
  6. Rebecca Gore1,
  7. Angela Laramie2,
  8. Daniel Okyere1,
  9. Chuan Sun1,
  10. Letitia Davis2,
  11. Margaret Quinn1
  1. 1University of Massachusetts Lowell, Lowell, MA, USA
  2. 2Massachusetts Department of Public Health, Boston MA, USA

Abstract

Objectives To follow up on our previous finding that home care (HC) aides have a substantial risk of injury with used sharp medical devices, this study’s goal was to identify modifiable aspects of aide-client encounters during HC visits that increase risk of sharps injuries (SI).

Method A survey of 1249 HC aides was conducted in eastern Massachusetts. Approximately half the participants (634) were employed by HC agencies, and half (615) directly by HC clients and their families. A questionnaire gathered data on aides’ most recent home visits, enabling quantification of hazardous working conditions. The specific investigation described here focused on understanding determinants of hazardous conditions likely to increase the risk of SI including: the aide finding used sharps lying around the house; assisting a client with using a sharp; and disposing of sharps. Poisson regression modelling was used to identify important predictors of handling or encountering used sharps. By linking these results to national data on HC visits and clients, we estimated the frequency with which these hazardous conditions occur to HC aides nationwide.

Results Although not authorised to do so, 7% of aides assisted clients to use a sharp. Aides were much more likely to encounter sharps if they were employed directly by clients/families than if employed through an agency. Other important determinants of sharps exposure included client medical conditions like diabetes, and aide characteristics including professional certification.

Conclusions The results are being investigated further through focus groups of HC aides and used to develop preventive interventions.

Statistics from Altmetric.com

Request Permissions

If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.