NMH

NMH | 2024 174 Quality & Safety Services T he Occupational Health Department contributes to a safe and healthy environment for both staff and patients at The National Maternity Hospital by providing a proactive service to all staff. The Department is comprised of one full- time Occupational Health Nurse, one Consultant Occupational Health Physician that has one session per week, and one Administrative Support. The key services provided include pre-employment health assessment, sickness absences review, vaccinations, management of occupational bodily fluid exposure (OBE's), pregnancy risk assessment, skin surveillance, occupation injuries, ergonomics assessment and staff support and counselling. In June 2023 the Occupational Health Department offered a bone density screening for all female staff over 50 yrs of age and the uptake was high. In April 2024, we presented our findings at the Research and Innovation Symposium Exhibition (RISE) and received 2nd prize Occupational Health in the innovative care pathways. The main findings of this study highlighted that offering Bone Density screening provided a great opportunity to meet staff within the Hospital who may never otherwise engage with the service, and by identifying those staff with osteoporosis and osteopenia, advice can be given early. There was over 250 appointments with the Occupational Health Physician. Referrals came from all categories within the hospital. See graph below. Many staff have huge challenges both professionally and personally in their lives. The Occupational Health Department provides a confidential service where staff can talk if they need support or help to guide them in the right direction, this helps contribute to keeping staff at work. It was another busy year with the winter vaccination campaign. NMH staff were offered a joint Flu and Covid-19 vaccinations on a two day roll out in October and weekly flu clinics and occasional Covid-19 vaccination clinics thereafter. The Covid-19 vaccination was received by 35% of staff, placing NMH as the highest hospital for uptake in the Dublin & South East Acute Hospitals and 74% of staff have received Flu vaccination 2nd highest uptake. 197 staff tested positive for Covid-19 seeing a significant drop from the previous year of 312. Jennifer Fitz-Gerald, CMM2 Occupational Health. Prof Shane Higgins, Master, Jennifer Fitz Gerald, Occupational Health CNS and Prof Fionnuala McAuliffe, RISE Committee Chair and Consultant Obstetrician & Gynaecologist. Jennifer was awarded second prize for her project titled 'Bone Density Screening.JPG Health + Social Care Professionals 0 Medical Dental Midwifery Students Management / Admin Midwifery / Nursing Occupational Health Referrals General Support Staff 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 3 9 21 12 83 123

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