Hazard Analysis and Safe Staffing Workloads

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Hazard analysis implementation and evaluation includes:

Recognizing high-risk tasks that require a proactive intervention to reduce injuries, such as patient handling, procedures involving sharps, and medication administration involving hazardous drugs (Powell-Cope et al., 2014; OSHA, 2019).
Providing structured and routine monitoring to identify early indications of hazards such as environment of care rounding or prevention of hazards in advance of implementation to mitigate and eliminate injuries to staff and patients.
Providing a variety of solutions (e.g., staff education, access to appropriate technology) to mitigate hazards early as part of leadership decision-making across all appropriate stakeholders.

Providing safe staffing levels and workloads includes:

Identifying and utilizing evidence-based standards for staffing of interdisciplinary teams based on best practices such as the American Nurses Association (ANA) staffing standards (American Nurses Association, n.d.).
Monitoring elements and standards to assure that staffing levels and appropriate workloads are maintained.
Implementing rapid solutions such as safety staffing huddles with managers after identifying high-risk staffing levels or heavy workloads.
Reviewing state requirements for staffing standards (Powell-Cope G, Haun J, Rugs D, 2013).