Monitoring for Health Hazards at Work


Book Description

Monitoring for Health Hazards at Work has become an essential companion for students and professionals in occupational hygiene, offering a concise account of the dangers faced in a wide variety of work environments and giving practical, step-by-step guidance to gauge exposure. It includes: Coverage of most major health hazards: airborne dust, fibres, gases, vapours, noise, radiation, and biological agents Accounts of the latest equipment and techniques required to monitor such hazards Full guidance on how to undertake risk assessments Now thoroughly revised and restructured by an eminent new team of authors, the fourth edition brings this valuable handbook right up to date.




Advances in Patient Safety


Book Description

v. 1. Research findings -- v. 2. Concepts and methodology -- v. 3. Implementation issues -- v. 4. Programs, tools and products.




Keeping Patients Safe


Book Description

Building on the revolutionary Institute of Medicine reports To Err is Human and Crossing the Quality Chasm, Keeping Patients Safe lays out guidelines for improving patient safety by changing nurses' working conditions and demands. Licensed nurses and unlicensed nursing assistants are critical participants in our national effort to protect patients from health care errors. The nature of the activities nurses typically perform â€" monitoring patients, educating home caretakers, performing treatments, and rescuing patients who are in crisis â€" provides an indispensable resource in detecting and remedying error-producing defects in the U.S. health care system. During the past two decades, substantial changes have been made in the organization and delivery of health care â€" and consequently in the job description and work environment of nurses. As patients are increasingly cared for as outpatients, nurses in hospitals and nursing homes deal with greater severity of illness. Problems in management practices, employee deployment, work and workspace design, and the basic safety culture of health care organizations place patients at further risk. This newest edition in the groundbreaking Institute of Medicine Quality Chasm series discusses the key aspects of the work environment for nurses and reviews the potential improvements in working conditions that are likely to have an impact on patient safety.




Occupational Health and Workplace Monitoring at Chemical Agent Disposal Facilities


Book Description

In keeping with a congressional mandate (Public Law 104-484) and the Chemical Weapons Convention, the United States is currently destroying its chemical weapons stockpile. The Army must ensure that the chemical demilitarization workforce is protected from the risks of exposure to hazardous chemicals during disposal operations and during and after facility closure. Good industrial practices developed in the chemical and nuclear energy industries and other operations that involve the processing of hazardous materials include workplace monitoring of hazardous species and a systematic occupational health program for monitoring workers' activities and health. In this report, the National Research Council Committee on Review and Evaluation of the Army Chemical Stockpile Disposal Program examines the methods and systems used at JACADS and TOCDF, the two operational facilities, to monitor the concentrations of airborne and condensed-phase chemical agents, agent breakdown products, and other substances of concern. The committee also reviews the occupational health programs at these sites, including their industrial hygiene and occupational medicine components. Finally, it evaluates the nature, quality, and utility of records of workplace chemical monitoring and occupational health programs.




Improving Healthcare Quality in Europe Characteristics, Effectiveness and Implementation of Different Strategies


Book Description

This volume, developed by the Observatory together with OECD, provides an overall conceptual framework for understanding and applying strategies aimed at improving quality of care. Crucially, it summarizes available evidence on different quality strategies and provides recommendations for their implementation. This book is intended to help policy-makers to understand concepts of quality and to support them to evaluate single strategies and combinations of strategies.




Patient Safety and Quality


Book Description

"Nurses play a vital role in improving the safety and quality of patient car -- not only in the hospital or ambulatory treatment facility, but also of community-based care and the care performed by family members. Nurses need know what proven techniques and interventions they can use to enhance patient outcomes. To address this need, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), with additional funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, has prepared this comprehensive, 1,400-page, handbook for nurses on patient safety and quality -- Patient Safety and Quality: An Evidence-Based Handbook for Nurses. (AHRQ Publication No. 08-0043)." - online AHRQ blurb, http://www.ahrq.gov/qual/nurseshdbk/




Measuring the Quality of Health Care


Book Description

The National Roundtable on Health Care Quality was established in 1995 by the Institute of Medicine. The Roundtable consists of experts formally appointed through procedures of the National Research Council (NRC) who represent both public and private-sector perspectives and appropriate areas of substantive expertise (not organizations). From the public sector, heads of appropriate Federal agencies serve. It offers a unique, nonadversarial environment to explore ongoing rapid changes in the medical marketplace and the implications of these changes for the quality of health and health care in this nation. The Roundtable has a liaison panel focused on quality of care in managed care organizations. The Roundtable convenes nationally prominent representatives of the private and public sector (regional, state and federal), academia, patients, and the health media to analyze unfolding issues concerning quality, to hold workshops and commission papers on significant topics, and when appropriate, to produce periodic statements for the nation on quality of care matters. By providing a structured opportunity for regular communication and interaction, the Roundtable fosters candid discussion among individuals who represent various sides of a given issue.




Guidelines for Process Safety Metrics


Book Description

Process safety metrics is a topic of frequent conversation within chemical industry associations. Guidelines for Process Safety Metrics provides basic information on process safety performance indicators, including a comprehensive list of metrics for measuring performance and examples as to how they can be successfully applied over both the short and long term. For engineers, insurers, corporate traininers, military personnel, government officials, students, and managers involved in production, product and process development, Guidelines for Process Safety Metrics can help determine appropriate metrics useful in monitoring performance and improving process safety programs. Note: CD-ROM/DVD and other supplementary materials are not included as part of eBook file.




Maintenance, Monitoring, Safety, Risk and Resilience of Bridges and Bridge Networks


Book Description

Maintenance, Monitoring, Safety, Risk and Resilience of Bridges and Bridge Networks contains the lectures and papers presented at the Eighth International Conference on Bridge Maintenance, Safety and Management (IABMAS 2016), held in Foz do Iguaçu, Paraná, Brazil, 26-30 June, 2016. This volume consists of a book of extended abstracts and a DVD containing the full papers of 369 contributions presented at IABMAS 2016, including the T.Y. Lin Lecture, eight Keynote Lectures, and 360 technical papers from 38 countries. The contributions deal with the state-of-the-art as well as emerging concepts and innovative applications related to all main aspects of bridge maintenance, safety, management, resilience and sustainability. Major topics covered include: advanced materials, ageing of bridges, assessment and evaluation, bridge codes, bridge diagnostics, bridge management systems, composites, damage identification, design for durability, deterioration modeling, earthquake and accidental loadings, emerging technologies, fatigue, field testing, financial planning, health monitoring, high performance materials, inspection, life-cycle performance and cost, load models, maintenance strategies, non-destructive testing, optimization strategies, prediction of future traffic demands, rehabilitation, reliability and risk management, repair, replacement, residual service life, resilience, robustness, safety and serviceability, service life prediction, strengthening, structural integrity, and sustainability. This volume provides both an up-to-date overview of the field of bridge engineering as well as significant contributions to the process of making more rational decisions concerning bridge maintenance, safety, serviceability, resilience, sustainability, monitoring, risk-based management, and life-cycle performance using traditional and emerging technologies for the purpose of enhancing the welfare of society. It will serve as a valuable reference to all involved with bridge structure and infrastructure systems, including students, researchers and engineers from all areas of bridge engineering.