Hospitals may not top OSHA’s enforcement list compared to high-risk industrial sectors, but they are far from exempt—especially when it comes to workplace violence and serious injury reports.
There is a lot for an employee to learn when they start at a new laboratory. During their onboarding, they will learn the standard operating procedures for cleaning, using, and servicing lab equipment. They will learn about the proper handling and disposal of hazardous materials and waste. They...
In this guest column, Dan Scungio, MT(ASCP), SLS, laboratory safety officer for multihospital system Sentara Healthcare in Virginia, and otherwise known as “Dan, the Lab Safety Man,” discusses the important issues that affect your job every day. Today, he...
Plan, do, check, and act. When a problem emerges in the laboratory, it’s not enough to just respond and move on. You also need to find out what caused it and how to prevent it from happening again. Without closing the loop, the safety problem will linger in your lab until it’s noticed by...
In this guest column, Dan Scungio, MT(ASCP), SLS, laboratory safety officer for multihospital system Sentara Healthcare in Virginia, and otherwise known as “Dan, the Lab Safety Man,” discusses the important issues that affect your job every day. Today he discussed lab exposure.
Hospitals are constantly grappling with the dangers of drug diversion, as illustrated by a $2 million settlement between Cheshire Medical Center and federal authorities, among many other cases.
In healthcare, if it’s not documented, it’s not done—including lab safety. If you want to cover all the safety steps and be able to prove that those steps were taken, providing lab staff with easy and effective ways to complete documentation is essential. As more recordkeeping becomes digital...
This is the second part of our story on managing your laboratory waste streams to reduce costs and improve safety. In this part of the interview, we will go over common waste mistakes and advice, along with your responsibility over your waste and when it ends.
In laboratory safety circles, one of the most overlooked aspects is preparedness for hazardous chemical spills. While hospital labs are well equipped to handle day-to-day safety concerns, they often lack readiness for rare but high-risk events—such as fires, chemical spills, or emergency...
Regular trash is bad enough, but the things that laboratories throw out are dangerous as well as egregious: used needles and sharps, body fluids, caustic chemicals, and items that will burst into flames in the right conditions. Lab staff can be injured by improper disposal of chemical waste, but...
