Biological Risk Management

For Point-of-Care Testing Sites

Key points

  • Point-of-care (POC) testing involves potential risks, including exposure to biological organisms and hazardous chemicals.
  • Following risk management guidance in POC testing sites helps reduce risks and ensures the safety of staff, patients, and the community.
  • Access information and resources on biological risks and risk management processes.

Overview

Point-of-care (POC) testing staff support health and reduce risk. As someone who delivers POC testing, you help people understand their health status. You collect specimens that contain biological material, such as blood or saliva, from people to test and determine what is making them sick. The results from these tests can help the people you serve make informed decisions about what to do next.

From the time you start each testing process until you finish, there are risks involved. Use this guidance to help make sure you reduce those risks as much as possible to keep you and your coworkers, patients, customers, family, and community safe and healthy while you perform POC tests.

Learn how to evaluate and reduce risks using the information below; learn why risk assessment is important in your role here.

Risk

When you're working with patients and the specimens they provide for testing, you are at risk of getting sick or hurt. You can also pass on sickness you get on the job to people you work with, to family and friends you see after work, or to people you come in contact with after you leave work. An injury can prevent you and others from working.

Collecting samples from people means you're handling human specimens, one type of biological material. This material can contain viruses that can cause sickness like influenza. It can also contain bacteria that can cause sickness like strep throat or a staph infection.

Viruses and bacteria are known as biological organisms. They can be dangerous to you and those around you. The chemicals you use in testing can create risks, too.

Terms to know

Aerosol-generating procedure: Any procedure that intentionally or inadvertently results in the creation of tiny liquid or solid particles, which become suspended in the air as aerosols or droplets.

Biological risk: A biological risk is the combination of the likelihood of an undesirable incident occurring and the severity of the harm if the incident happens. One example might be what can go wrong while testing blood from someone with hepatitis or HIV, such as a potential exposure that leads to an accidental infection.

Droplets: Tiny amounts of liquids that can come from a person (through breathing, sneezing, or coughing) or from collecting or processing samples. Droplets can contaminate surfaces or be ingested (breathed in or swallowed) by testing staff, patients, or others.

Hazard: Something from biological material that can cause harm, such as viruses or bacteria (living biological organisms). A biological hazard can reside in a human specimen, like mucus, that you can collect from inside the nose, or that someone can cough up from their lungs. A human specimen can carry viruses or bacteria that might harm you or make you sick. For example, if someone is sick with tuberculosis (TB), the infectious bacteria that they may put into the air when they sneeze is a biological hazard.

Personal protective equipment (PPE): Equipment and/or clothing worn by personnel to provide a barrier against biological organisms, thereby minimizing the likelihood of exposure. PPE includes, but is not limited to, laboratory coats, gowns, gloves, safety glasses, safety goggles, masks, and respirators.

Point-of-care (POC) testing involves performing a test outside of a laboratory that produces a rapid and reliable result, aiding in identifying or managing chronic diseases and acute infections.

Risk Assessment: Process of evaluating the risks arising from a hazard(s), taking into account the adequacy of any existing controls, prioritizing those risks, and deciding whether the risks are acceptable. Risk assessment is one part of risk management.

Risk Management: Overall process to identify, evaluate, control, and monitor risks.

Risk Mitigation: Actions and control measures that are put into place to reduce the risks to an acceptable level.

Steps

Risk management is a five-step process of identifying and analyzing risks and taking steps to reduce or eliminate them.

Circular graphic of the risk management process.
The five-step risk management process.

See ISO 35001 for the complete risk management process.

Resources

For more details on the complete risk management process, see the World Health Organization (WHO) Laboratory Biosafety Manual, 4th Edition. Read section 2, pages 5-26. You can also refer to Section II of the CDC/NIH Biosafety in Microbiological and Biomedical Laboratories, 6th Edition.

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