Health Care Workers and Infections

Is your work catching?

Did you know? A health care worker is more likely to die from Hepatitis B virus than by the AIDS virus. You don't have to have physical contact with an infected patient to catch something. Infection can also come from contact with used needles, laundry, utensils, bandages - items that have been contaminated by blood or bodily fluids or substances. Some infections can travel through the air or be carried by insects or animals. No one in the health care field is immune. And you don't have to work in a hospital. Infections can be picked up while giving care in a home, a school or a nursing home or by a worker in a lab, kitchen or waste disposal area.

Caring for patients doesn't mean giving up your health

Not all that many years ago, many, many patients died in childbirth, after surgery or in epidemics. Eventually, people discovered that many of these deaths could be prevented by stopping the spread of infection. Caregivers washed their hands after handling a patient. They started to sterilize instruments and utensils and used clean linen for each patient. How many of the caregivers died? Quite a lot. The measures started as medical advances to keep patients alive also gave some protection to caregivers.

Someone caring for the sick during one of the historic epidemics would not recognize today's health care industry. The work has become increasingly sophisticated, segmented and specialized. It can still be dangerous.

Procedures can protect you against infection

Your workplace will have procedures to protect against infection. The best precautions apply to all body fluids, secretions, excrement and drainage from all patients.

This list contains some of the procedures that can protect health care workers against infection. All workers who come into contact with blood or body fluids, including caregivers, laundry, housekeeping and custodial workers should use infection control procedures.

wearing gloves and protective clothing wearing goggles used needles and other sharp instruments are thrown away into containers that cannot be punctured blood and other specimens are labelled clearly and put into another container for carrying materials soiled with blood or body fluids are put into leak-proof bags and labelled washing hands before and after all procedures washing all parts of your body that were exposed to blood or body fluids using a weak solution of household bleach to clean possibly contaminated surfaces

Use your rights

• The law requires employers to protect workers from hazards in the workplace.
• For protecting yourself from infection, that means proper equipment, training and procedures.
• Find out what the procedures are in your workplace.
• Workers have the right to know about workplace hazards and the right to receive proper training.
• To find out more about the responsibilities of employers and employees, talk to your union or the Workers Health and Safety Centre.

What you can do.

1. Talk with your co-workers about the information on this sheet.
2. Write down what you think and put it into an InfoSwap box or give it to your health and safety representative.