SARS-CoV-2 Could be a
Game-Changer in the
Prevention of Sharps Injuries
and Body Fluid Exposures
By Kelly M. Pyrek
the March 2020 issue of Healthcare Hygiene magazine,
In we presented perspectives from experts relating to the
20th anniversary of the federal Needlestick Safety & Prevention
Act (NSPA), signed into law in 2000 in the hope that it could bring
new awareness to the dangers of occupational exposures and
percutaneous injuries in the healthcare environment. Although the
NPSA, in and of itself, is not enforceable in healthcare facilities,
it required the Occupational Safety and Health Administration
(OSHA) to incorporate additional requirements in its Bloodborne
Pathogens Standard, including more specific requirements for the
use of device with sharps injury prevention (SIP) features, annual
frontline employee evaluation and selection of those devices, and
maintaining a sharps injury log.
To review, the NSPA revised OSHA’s standard regulating
occupational exposure to bloodborne pathogens and sought
to further reduce healthcare workers’ exposure by imposing
additional requirements upon employers regarding their
sharps-related procedures. OSHA’s regulations modified the
definition of “engineering controls” and added definitions for
the terms “sharps with engineered sharps injury protection”
and “needleless systems;” required employers to consider and
implement new technologies when they update their exposure
control plan; required employers to solicit employee input
with respect to appropriate engineering controls; and required
employers to maintain a sharps injury log.
The NPSA raised awareness around risk mitigation and
prevention of sharps-related injuries and bloodborne pathogen
exposure, but experts agree the (safety-engineered) needle is
barely moving on an issue critical to infection prevention and
control in healthcare institutions.
“After 2000, we saw reductions in injuries overall, but in the
last several years, injuries have started to increase, especially
among physicians using suture needles and nurses using disposable
syringes,” says Amber Hogan Mitchell, DrPH, MPH, CPH, president
and executive director of the International Safety Center. “These
are two areas where we must remain diligent about capturing
injury data, evaluating safer devices and work practices, and
reducing the numbers of injuries.”
Data indicate improvement still needs to be made on
sharps-related injuries and exposures. Mitchell recently addressed
new data from EPINet in a webinar sponsored by the American
Society of Safety Professionals, and indicated that sharps-injury
reported incidents were steady in non-teaching facilities (26.0 per
100 ADC) and that progress was being made in teaching hospitals
(26.4 per 100 ADC); however, some data indicated dangerous
trends persisted. The total rate for sharps injuries was 26.3 per
Summary of Needlesticks and Sharp Object Injuries (SOI) per ADC; EPINet
45
40
35
30
y = 1.48x+ 35.48
25
20
15
10
5
0
2015 2016 2017 2018 2019
Total injuries Teaching Non-Teaching Linear (Total injuries)
All graphs and charts courtesy of Amber Hogan Mitchell/International Safety Center
14 august 2020 • www.healthcarehygienemagazine.com