On December 2016, Democratic United States Representative John Conyers Jr., who represents Michigan’s 14th District, introduced national legislation for the third time that calls for a national standard for the safe handling of dependent patients and residents throughout the healthcare system. H.R. 4266, The Nurse and Health Care Worker Protection Act of 2015, directs the Secretary of Labor to issue an occupational safety and health standard to reduced injuries to patients, direct-care registered nurses and all other healthcare workers” by establishing a safe patient handling and injury prevention standard , and for other purposes” (H.R. 4266, 2015). The standard specifies “the use of engineering controls to perform lifting, transferring, …show more content…
Each health care employer shall upon request, make available their findings and data for at least 5 years; 5) post a uniform notice that explains the standard and the procedures to report patient handling-related injuries. The notice must explains procedures to report patient handling-related injuries; and explains health care workers’ rights under this Act, including any whistleblower protections. Each health care employer shall conduct an annual written evaluation of the implementation of their programs. It requires the Secretary to conduct unscheduled inspections to ensure compliance with safety standards. The bill further 1) allows healthcare workers to refuse to accept an assignment in a healthcare facility that violates safety standards or for which such worker has not received required training; and 2) file complaints against employers who violate this Act. It prohibits employers from taking adverse actions against any health care worker who in good faith reports a violation, participates in an
Under this act, employers are responsible for reporting certain types of incidents, accidents or illnesses to the Health and Safety Exectutive, or the local authority.
As health care workers we are under a legal obligation to protect an individual from any kind of abuse, whether it is physical, financial, emotional, sexual or psychological .Legislation, policies and procedures exist to promote a safer working environment and reduce the potential for risks occurring. They are tailored for the needs of each setting, known and understood by employers and employees and reviewed on a regular basis.
Describe how current health and safety legislation, policies and procedures are implemented in the setting
- Commission Directive 2003/63/EC (brought into UK law by inclusion in the Medicines for Human Use (Fees and Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2003)
The Nurse and Health Care Worker Protection Act of 2015, or H.R. 4266, was reintroduced to congress in December of 2015 by Representative John Conyers and Senator Al Franken (Mitchell & Dawson, 2016). It is legislation that attempts to protect patients, nurses, nurse assistants, and other healthcare workers from injuries as a result of unsafe patient handling and mobilization. Congress found that in 2014, registered nurses were the sixth largest profession who were reporting musculoskeletal disorders and injuries as a result of their employment with 11,360 cases; the second highest profession in 2014 of reported musculoskeletal injuries was nursing assistants with 20,020 cases (H.R. 4266, 2015).
The Health and Social Care Act 2012 came into force with crucial principles including new structures and arrangements in health care services to safeguard and strengthen the future of NHS and maintain the modernisation plan. In this Act, many new changes has been made to a number of existing Acts, National Health Services Act (NHS 2006), in order to enable health care system to tackle the existing challenges and also avoid any potential crisis in future. It has also introduced the proper allocation of NHS fund and budget, and improved the integrated care between NHS and social care services to promote patients’ choice in terms of delivering quality care.
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is a federal statute that was signed into law in America by President Barack Obama on March 23, 2010. It is divided into 10 titles.
The American Health Care Act of 2017 (AHCA), H.R. 1628, is the House Republicans ' driving proposition to "cancellation and supplant" the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and "defund" Planned Parenthood (Civic Impulse, 2017). The AHCA is a spending compromise charge that is a piece of the 2017 government spending process; this status implies that it can 't be delayed in the United States Senate and can subsequently pass the Senate with a basic larger part of votes. It would revoke the parts of the Affordable Care Act inside the extent of the government spending plan, including arrangements contained in the Internal Revenue Code. Nevertheless, the Democrats are opposing the approval of the AHCA, in which
Patient protection and affordable care act was enacted in 2010 with the main purpose of minimizing the cost, improving the obtainability and affordability of health insurance. Uninsured rate will decreased at a faster rate.. It will achieve healthcare reachability to as many people as by extending public and private insurance. The Affordable act has included following: any one with pre-existing condition can not be denied of coverage, children under 26 may be eligible for coverage under their parents insurance, insurance companies can not cancel your coverage due to withdrawals.
On March 23, 2010, President Obama signed comprehensive health reform, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), into law. The United States is at the beginning of a long overdue and much needed overhaul to the health care system. The changes made to the law by legislation, focuses on: provisions to expand public health coverage, an effort to control health care costs, initiatives to improve health care delivery system, and reorganization of spending under Medicare (Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, 2014). More than 90 changes were included in the law; some went into effect almost immediately such as: posting of caloric details at major chain restaurants, taxation on tanning, and more breastfeeding rooms and
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which is commonly known as the Affordable Care Act and informally labeled Obamacare, is a federal statute that President Barack Obama approved in 2010. Its aim is to ensure that all Americans have access to quality and affordable health care and that the nation’s health care system is in a position to contain the expected costs of the program (U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, 2015). It is made up of nine titles, which essentially outline the anticipated implications of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Among these titles, the ACA outlines strategies to increase accessibility to quality and affordable health care by transforming health insurance in the country, improving the overall quality and efficiency of health care, and redefining the role of public health programs. It also covers the distribution of resources in addition to increasing the transparency and integrity of the health care programs with a particular focus on the utilization of distributed resources. Since the implementation of this law, citizens have had the opportunity to observe its impact on the health care system, and hospice care is not an exception. It is important to mention that some of these impacts were expected even before the implementation. Examples include the dynamic change in supply and demand of hospice care, the number of people with access to care, and some financial impacts. Other consequences such as the role of technology,
Health care costs in the United States are higher than ever before and the issue of how much Americans are spending on their health care is more prevalent than ever. Factors such as unhealthy lifestyles, increasing use of medical technology, increasing costs for prescription drugs, as well as large out of pocket premiums and lower household incomes all contribute to the high costs of medical spending. The United States is the global leader in spending on health care, compared to its European counterparts, most of whom offer various forms of universal health care to their residents (Squires and Anderson). With the passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) in 2010, the United States is trying its own form of universal health care in an effort
Under the ACA, there are several tax provisions that is scheduled to take effect as different sections of the health reform legislation are implemented. The US government has given the IRS the authorized to provide premium tax credits to individuals and insurance companies. The calculations are based on the family size specifically those that are making between 138% and 400% of the federal poverty levels, in states that have expanded the Medicaid eligibility and 100% to 138% are available in states that have not accepted the expansion. Another requirement is individuals not eligible for Medicare and Medicaid and Individuals whom have purchase qualifying health insurance plans on federal and state – run exchanges.
Hospitals are hazardous work environments. Although the Occupational Safety and Health Administration- or OSHA-recordable injuries and illnesses have been declining in all industries including hospitals within the United States, OSHA-recordable rates remain “nearly double the rate for private industry as a whole, and it is also higher than the rates in construction and manufacturing—two industries that are traditionally thought to be relatively hazardous” (OSHA, 2013, p. 1). Hospitals have reduced injuries over time, but the construction and manufacturing industries have definitely exceeded hospital workplace safely in the past 20 years. The vast majority of the reportedly preventable injuries in hospitals include slipping, tripping, or falling from using incorrect lifting techniques, most especially when lifting patients who are physically disabled or challenged.
In the challenge of the increasing demand and pressures on health attention from the general public, the aging populations, and development of new technologies calls for policies that are ready to embrace the new patients’ needs. Registered Nurse safe staffing Act was introduced to US senate in April, 2015 and the goal is that every healthcare provider or hospital stablish an appropriate number of registered nurses provide direct patient care in each unit and on each shift of the hospital to ensure staffing levels that: address the unique characteristics of the patients and hospital