ONS Connect - August 2008 - (Page 11)

Marianne Casale, RN, MSN, CS, APN, C, AOCN®, provides education to ensure that her staff is up to date on safe-handling practices. (Also pictured is Diane Marthers, RN, BSN.) Implementing institutional policies based on those guidelines is no easy task. Oncology nurses often face challenges in ensuring that their institutional policies are up to date and that chemotherapy drugs are handled and administered safely. Developing a Safe-Handling Policy ONS member Anna Vioral, MSN, RN, OCN®, oncology quality coordinator at West Penn-Allegheny Health System in Pittsburgh, PA, says that in 2002 Allegheny General Hospital (AGH) reassessed how its chemotherapeutic agents were being managed and which guidelines should be revised and implemented in its policies to best correlate to national safe-handling practice guidelines. As the oncology clinical education specialist for the oncology unit at that time, Vioral established a multidisciplinary safe-handling task force for hazardous agents, with physicians, nurses, and representatives from pharmacy, administration, and other hospital-wide departments. Over a period of 18 months, the new safe-handling policy was developed and implemented based on ASHP, ONS, NIOSH, and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) safehandling guidelines. The Department of Health expressed during a visit how impressed they were with the level of practice sanctioned in such a short period of time. “The policy and procedures ensure that healthcare workers and patients are protected from harmful exposure by reducing environmental workplace contamination through safe-handling measures,” Vioral says. “The measures include such safe practices as tracking how we deliver and administer the agents, including priming bags with August 2008 ONS CONNECT 11

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ONS Connect - August 2008 Contents Editor's Note Just In Safe Handling of Chemotherapy A Year in the Life—Month Eight Put Evidence Into Practice to Manage Dyspnea Web Connect Capitol Connection Notice Nursing Now Caregiver Care KRAS Status Predicts Response to Cetuximab for Metastatic Colorectal Cancer Calendar of Events Working for You Staying on Top

ONS Connect - August 2008

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