During the period of October 2005 through September 2006, doctors’ offices received 156 citations for bloodborne pathogen violations resulting in $51,064 in fines. (http://www.osha.gov). Additionally, during that same period general medical and surgical hospitals received 118 citations while nursing care facilities received 344 citations (http://www.osha.gov).
OSHA fines for noncompliance can be significant and range from $7,000 to $70,000 depending on the nature of the offense. Based upon this data, the bloodborne pathogen standard is clearly an area which OSHA targets during its on site compliance inspections. Given the importance that OSHA has placed upon this standard, compliance in this area is of particular importance. The OSHA website is a very useful resource for OSHA related compliance information. There are a number of specific publications developed by OSHA to assist with compliance and training related to the bloodborne pathogen standard. The links are as follows:
A PowerPoint presentation on OSHA’s Bloodborne Pathogen Standard available at:
http://www.osha.gov/dcsp/ote/library/bloodborne/revised_bbp_standard/index.html
A number of Bloodborne Fact Sheets available at:
http://www.osha.gov/OshDoc/data_BloodborneFacts/index.html
A model Exposure Control Plan available at:
http://www.osha.gov/Publications/osha3186.html
Medical & Dental Offices: A Guide to Compliance with OSHA Standards, available at:
http://www.osha.gov/Publications/osha3187.pdf
An additional non-OSHA sponsored resource which may be of interest to hospitals is "OSHA’s Most Cited Hospital Violations: Strategies for Creating a Safe Work Place", an article by Ron Stoker available at http://www.isips.org/reports/MIC0607W14.pdf.
