Legislation / Cal-OSHA - Safety Orders for Violence Prevention in Healthcare
Cal-OSHA - Safety Orders for Violence Prevention in Healthcare
09/27/2018 by Bruce Chapman

Cal-OSHA Regulations: General Indsutry Safety Orders: Safe Practices and Personal Protection: Title 8.Sub Ch.7, Group 2, Article 7 (Section 3342)

Section 3342. Violence Prevention in Health Care.

Scope This section applies to work in health care facilities, service categories, and operations including health facilities, home health care, emergency medical services, drug treatment, outpatient correctional medical services, acute care hospitals, psychiatric hospitals and special hospitals.
The employer shall provide all safeguards required by this section, including provision of personal protective equipment, training, and medical services, at no cost to the employee, at a reasonable time and place for the employee, and during the employee’s paid time.
Workplace violence means any act of violence or threat of violence that occurs at the work site. The term workplace violence shall not include lawful acts of self-defense or defense of others. Workplace violence includes the following:
  1. The threat or use of physical force against an employee that results in, or has a high likelihood of resulting in, injury, psychological trauma, or stress, regardless of whether the employee sustains an injury;
  2.  An incident involving the threat or use of a firearm or other dangerous weapon, including the use of common objects as weapons, regardless of whether the employee sustains an injury.

Training. The employer shall provide effective training to employees, that addresses the workplace violence risks that the employees are reasonably anticipated to encounter in their jobs.

Employees assigned to respond to alarms or other notifications of violent incidents or whose assignments involve confronting or controlling persons exhibiting aggressive or violent behavior shall be provided training on the following topics prior to initial assignment and at least annually thereafter. This additional training shall include:

(A) General and personal safety measures;
(B) Aggression and violence predicting factors;
(C) The assault cycle;
(D) Characteristics of aggressive and violent patients and victims;
(E) Verbal intervention and de-escalation techniques and physical maneuvers to defuse and prevent violent behavior;
(F) Strategies to prevent physical harm;
(G) Appropriate and inappropriate use of restraining techniques in accordance with Title 22;
(H) Appropriate and inappropriate use of medications as chemical restraints in accordance with Title 22;
(I) An opportunity to practice the maneuvers and techniques included in the training with other employees they will work with, including a meeting to debrief the practice session. Problems found shall be corrected.

Title 22 are the CMS regulations on restraint and seclusion, namely restraint or seclusion may be imposed only to ensure the immediate physical safety of the patient, a staff member or others and must discontinued at the earliest possible tiem.  The patient also has the right to safe implementation of restraint or seclusion by trained staff [42. CFR Section 482.13]

 

Disclaimer. Nothing in this post is intended to create an attorney client relationship.  Nothing written or spoken constitutes legal advice and should not be used as a substitute for obtaining legal advice. There may be additional laws, rules, policies applicable to the use of restraint and force in your state. The above is an overview of information compiled from individual sources that are maintained and
updated with varying frequencies. While we attempt to keep the information current, readers should read the source information directly,  go to the source to check for updates or conduct further research.  For information and/or legal advice, consult with your attorney or States Attorney General.