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Strong unions are critical to the safety of healthcare workers and patients
In May 2019, the 194 countries that set the World Health Organization’s agenda met at the 72nd World Health Assembly and supported the establishment of the World Patient Safety Day to be commemorated annually on September 17. But this year’s COVID-19 pandemic has revealed the enormous challenges and risks facing healthcare workers globally, including hospital-borne infections, violence, stigma, psychological and emotional disorders, illnesses and including death. Additionally, working in unfair, abusive and stressful environments makes healthcare workers more prone to making mistakes that can lead to patient harm. That is why the theme for World Patient Safety Day 2020 is “The safety of healthcare workers: a priority for patient safety”.
Safe healthcare workers, safe patients
“Although the Indian government has made a laudable decision to protect healthcare workers from physical attacks by patients, family members or others, healthcare workers must also be protected from frequent burnout, psychological distress, exposure to pathogens, long working hours, fatigue and many issues that also affect the safety of both workers and patients, ”said Jibin TC, National Secretary of Labor, United Nurses Association (UNA), India. He spoke on a panel co-organized by Public Services International (PSI).
The ongoing pandemic has placed healthcare workers at unprecedented occupational risk of morbidity and mortality: lack of or inadequate personal protective equipment (PPE), exposure to infected patients, work overload and / or poor infection control, makes them extremely vulnerable to the occupational coronavirus. infection. While some of the problems and challenges facing healthcare workers today are specific to the pandemic, many are pre-existing problems that have been exacerbated by it.
“There are many hospitals where nurses suffer from a shortage of basic services such as masks, isolation gowns, face shields, test kits, etc. In addition, there is a severe shortage of nurses in both public and private hospitals. Ideally, every ventilated patient should have a nurse in the intensive care unit (ICU), but many private hospitals do not maintain the nurse-to-patient ratio, which is also a major threat to patient safety, ”Jibin added.
At the beginning of the pandemic, the shortage of PPE was a major problem for the safety of healthcare workers. But now the concern has shifted to the quality of the PPE delivered to healthcare workers. “Many hospitals provide very poor quality PPE to nurses and other health professionals. There is no adequate standardization of PPE kits. Also, many hospitals have 12-hour shifts with PPE kits for nurses, even when the government insists on a 6-hour shift. Nurses are often not adequately supported for isolation and quarantine. There are cases where the nurses were infected with coronavirus (or their family members tested positive) but the hospital administration did not cover the bills. Only a few hospitals offer free treatment and management for nurses in case they contract an infection, ”Jibin said.
For example, when a nurse lost her sight (in one of her eyes) due to an explosion in the humidifier of an oxygen cylinder, not only did she have to leave work, but the organization did not compensate her in any way. “You won’t get a job because you lost the sight in one eye,” shared Jibin.
He demanded that samples be collected well in advance to identify diseases among nurses, as well as immediate isolation, periodic screening and free vaccination of nurses for a variety of vaccine-preventable diseases.
The safety of workers and patients also needs strong unions
“A unionized workforce leads to greater patient safety, as well as better public health and, of course, better conditions for workers. There is ample international evidence that higher levels of union density lead to better outcomes for both workers and patients. For example, a recent study in the US found that COVID-19-related mortality was 30% lower in unionized hospices than in non-union hospices, ”said Kate Lappin, Regional Secretary for the Asia Pacific region, Public Services International (PSI).
The concerns of healthcare workers, such as nurses, can only be effectively addressed (for the safety of workers and patients) if they have a strong voice. “… and that can only happen through a collective process of having a union that is not only powerful enough to be able to raise specific issues, but also to negotiate long-term changes in both the workplace and policies. public, “added Kate. .
When healthcare workers are unionized, they have a clear method of raising concerns about patient or worker safety that would otherwise be ignored. Other methods such as hotlines are an eye wash and are not effective in addressing these concerns of patients and healthcare workers because there is no guaranteed follow-up. In addition, health workers such as nurses must participate in the responses to each situation.
In a non-union space, if nurses communicate their concerns to management, they risk losing their jobs. “But in a unionized space, these can be addressed. For example, when there is inadequate personal protective equipment or when government-set policies are not followed, these issues can be effectively raised and addressed only through a unionized workforce. In various countries around the world, we can see that the more unionized nurses have been, the higher level of respect they receive, the better conditions they have (also in terms of salary and working conditions), as well as a higher ratio of nurses per patient. This has been a challenge for the nurses’ unions and some of them have not only been able to influence policy, but have also contributed to the enactment of a law. After many years of campaigning, nurses in Melbourne obtained a law for the ratio of 3 to 1 patient per nurse in general wards and the ratio of one nurse to patient in ICU. That, of course, would not have happened without a clear and powerful union: the Melbourne Nurses Union is Australia’s largest nurses union and the power they have to protect public health more broadly, as well as the health of the workers, it has been very clear ”. shared Kate Lappin.
Bobby Ramakant – CNS (Citizen News Service)
(Bobby Ramakant is part of CNS and Asha Parivar, and winner of the WHO Director-General’s 2008 WNTD award. Follow him on Twitter @bobbyramakant or read www.bit.ly/BobbyRamakant)
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