ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH AND SAFETY
SERVICE HIGHLIGHTS SUMMARY FIT TESTING Fit testing is required on an annual basis by the Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) and is vital to ensuring that respiratory protection is effective. Without a fit test, the employee has no idea whether or not the respirator they are wearing will protect them. Beginning in February of 2020, EHS ramped up its fit testing activities in order to support the anticipated surge of health care workers needing to wear respiratory protection due to COVID-19.
PPE EVALUATIONS & TRAINING During the pandemic, many manufacturers have developed new PPE to meet the critical need of healthcare providers. But not all PPE is created equal, and evaluation of all PPE worn by staff is critical to ensure the appropriate level of protection. Proper use of safety equipment ensures that it provides the protection it was designed for. EHS, in collaboration with Healthcare Leadership, ensured that all new PPE used on campus was evaluated and staff were appropriately trained.
N95 REPROCESSING
The Pandemic has caused severe shortages in respiratory protection for healthcare workers. In order to ensure that UTMB workers could work safely while caring for patients, BSP tested and validated several different decontamination methods for the N95 reprocessing program in coordination with Healthcare leadership. BSP continues to coordinate and perform the N95 decontaminations for the reprocessing program for UTMB.
MEDICAL WASTE ASSESSMENT & DISPOSAL Environmental Protection Management (EPM) provides technical services for protecting UTMB’s environmental liabilities with regulatory oversight for the Institutional medical waste processes. UTMB’s medical waste operations are permitted by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) municipal solid waste permitting and must meet regulations for medical waste transport, treatment, and disposal. EPM staff support the Environment of Care Committee with a significant role in monitoring waste trends and Institutional compliance with training for UTMB employees on proper management of pharmaceutical and medical wastes.
BIOLOGICAL SHIPPING BSP supports shipping of biological material for UTMB researchers. BSP played an integral role in shipping SARs-CoV-2 virus and RNA, as well as one of the first infectious clones created in the world to reference laboratories and researchers nationally and worldwide to allow for swift countermeasure development and testing. BSP sent UTMB’s first shipment of SARs-CoV-2 on February 18th, 2020 and continues to ship these critical samples and infectious clones nationally and worldwide.
OVERFLOW SURGE SPACE ASSESSMENTS & MODIFICATIONS Early in the COVID-19 crisis it became clear that our current facility capacity might not meet demand. EHS worked directly with the Texas State Fire Marshal and healthcare leadership to identify potential areas and define changes needed for appropriate levels of safety and maximum utilization. EHS actively modified spaces such as: additional sleep rooms for physicians, gymnasium infirmary, and other spaces by improving life safety systems in preparation for a potential surge. Some spaces, such as the gymnasium, have since been converted back once the initial threat abated.
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Annual Report
