OPSIG could be your new best friend
By Steve MacArthur, Hospital Safety Consultant
In working with clients, I find myself frequently Googling (and re-Googling) certain topics, particularly the whole issue relative to the timing of fire drills (for whatever reason, the exact wording keeps eluding getting hard-wired into my noggin).
At any rate, I Googled “joint commission fire drill requirements” and lo and behold, there was a new entry that showed up right at the top of the page (how convenient). The click-through link for the entry was title OPSIG Memo, which prompted the internal query – what the heck is OPSIG?
As it turns out, OPSIG is a kicky new acronym that stands for “The Official Position on Standards & Interpretive Guidance” and this particular OPSIG deals with the requirements relating to the scheduling, etc., of fire drills. There is a reference number on the document that appears to indicate a source date in 2021, but I don’t think I’ve come across this before (though please feel free to let me know if this has been around for a while – this may be a case of the sightless porcine entity and the acorn—but I digress).
At any rate, now that I’ve run into this, I sincerely hope that there are more of these—I think it’s helpful in a way that the “Consistent Interpretations” column in Perspectives is generally not. I Googled “OPSIG memo” and this appears to be the only one, so perhaps it is experimental in nature, but I hope the proof of concept proves itself to be valuable. Those of you who are accredited by TJC might even be able to advocate for an expansion of the topics to be covered—I know I’ve going to try and get word to the folks in Chicago (beyond penning this item). I think this is a pretty good thing (I don’t want to scare them off by being too effusive).
About the Author: Steve MacArthur is a safety consultant with The Greeley Company in Danvers, Mass. He brings more than 30 years of healthcare management and consulting experience to his work with hospitals, physician offices, and ambulatory care facilities across the country. He is the author of HCPro's Hospital Safety Director's Handbook and is contributing editor for Healthcare Safety Leader. Contact Steve at stevemacsafetyspace@gmail.com.