Roughly 300 nursing homes can expect inspections by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. OSHA is targeting nursing and personal care homes with 20 or more employees that have a Days Away, Restricted or Transferred rate at or over 16 days. Facilities that have a Days Away From Work Injury and Illness case rate of 13 to 16 also may be inspected after the initial round is completed, officials said.
Days Away, Restricted, or Transferred (DART) Rate includes cases involving days away from work, restricted work activity, and transfers to another job and is calculated based on (N/EH) x (200,000) where N is the number of cases involving days away and/or job transfer or restriction, EH is the total number of hours worked by all employees during the calendar year, and 200,000 is the base for 100 full-time equivalent employees.
OSHA surveyors will focus on workplace factors such as ergonomics stressors, exposure to blood or other potentially infectious materials, exposure to tuberculosis, as well as slips, trips and falls, according to the agency directive. Long-term care facilities are targeted by the agency due to the high rates of injuries and illnesses experienced by workers.
This comes on the heels of a Labor Department Report that showed that the average number of skilled nursing facility workers injured on the job was 8.6 per 100 FTEs, compared to 5.6 workers in coal mines, 4.8 workers in tire manufacturing and 3.5 for building construction. The Labor Department chastised the industry for not reporting incidents and accidents.
Seems like this is an issue that will not go away and will probably get worse. If there is an expert out there that would like to write about this area, please contact me. It is important for our readers to stay abreast in this area.
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OSHA
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