...known anyone (a healthcare worker) who ACTUALLY acquired hepatitis or HIV/AIDS from a workplace exposure?
On the way to work this morning I was thinking about all of the years that I have been in Nursing. For about the first 3 years we didn't wear gloves for anything except particularly bad Code Browns or very nasty dressing changes. Of course, we wore sterile gloves for dressing changes that required it, trach care, foleys, assisting w/sterile procedures, etc. But for daily nursing care, you actually had to look around for a pair of gloves. I remember when gloves were first put in pt's rooms-in the closet, because it was required to have them there. We used to send the gloves home w/the pts, and usually the boxes were full, or nearly so!
Fortunately, I have never known anyone who acquired any infectious disease at work. Have any of you, and were they able to trace it to lack of, or improper use of, PPE?
