FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 15, 2000

CONTACT:
Hope Hall, 202-651-7027
Cindy Price, 202-651-7038
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www.nursingworld.org/rnrealnews

Washington, DC -- The American Nurses Association (ANA) applauded introduction of new legislation providing for needlestick protections under the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and commended the strong bipartisan cooperation on Capitol Hill that has moved the issue forward in recent weeks.

HR 5178, the Needlestick Safety Prevention Act, was introduced by Rep. Cass Ballenger (R-NC), chairman of the House Education and the Workforce Subcommittee on Workforce Protections, and Rep. Major Owens (D-NY), the subcommittee's ranking Democrat.

ANA has been active in advocating for this legislation that will protect health care workers from the approximately 800,000 needlestick injuries which occur in the United States annually. In June 2000, Rep. Ballenger's subcommittee held a hearing at which ANA member Karen Daley, MPH, RN, president of the Massachusetts Nurses Association (MNA), testified.

Daley has spent more than 25 years as a front line caregiver and staff nurse at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. She served as a senior staff nurse in the emergency department until January 1999, when she left clinical practice due to needlestick injury that resulted in her infection with both HIV and hepatitis C. Since that time, while continuing her work as MNA president, she has become actively engaged on a state and national level as an advocate for legislation to mandate use of safer needle devices in health care practice settings. Her compelling testimony has been critically important in educating policymakers across the nation about the need for needlestick protections.

"This injury and the life-altering consequences I am now suffering should not have happened," stated Daley. "And worst of all, this injury did not have to happen and would not have happened if a safer system had been in place in my work setting."

The new bill would amend the existing Bloodborne Pathogen Standard administered by the OSHA to require the use of safer devices to protect from sharps injuries. It would also require that employers solicit the input of non-managerial employees responsible for direct patient care who are potentially exposed to sharps injuries in identification, evaluation and selection of effective engineering and work practice controls.

"The involvement of front-line nurses in the selection of safety products is essential to ensure the right choices for patients and nurses," said ANA President Mary Foley, MS, RN.

The new bill would also require employers to maintain a sharps injury log to contain, at a minimum:

• the type and brand of device involved in the incident;
• the department or work area where the exposure incident occurred; and
• an explanation of how the incident occurred.

The information would be recorded and maintained in a way that would protect the confidentiality of the injured employees. The log would be an important source of data for researchers to determine the relative effectiveness and safety of devices now on the market and those that may be developed in the future.

ANA welcomes the important step towards substantial reduction in sharps injuries. Each day, thousands of health care workers are injured by contaminated needles and sharps. For some, one needlestick can become a devastating source of infection and illness that has a life long, life-altering and life-threatening impact. ANA strongly supports enactment of the Ballenger-Owens legislation.

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The American Nurses Association is the only full-service professional organization representing the nation's 2.6 million Registered Nurses through its 54 constituent associations. ANA advances the nursing profession by fostering high standards of nursing practice, promoting the economic and general welfare of nurses in the workplace, projecting a positive and realistic view of nursing, and by lobbying the Congress and regulatory agencies on health care issues affecting nurses and the public.

2000 press releases

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