how the home-based care givers could prevent the substantial occupational safety and health hazards they experience through different model scenarios

           how the home-based care givers could prevent the substantial occupational safety and health hazards they experience through different model scenarios

The first article talks about problems the home health care providers encounter while delivering clinical care to the aging population in the United States. It documents the occupational safety and health challenges of the care givers by presenting several scenarios from research studies. The objective for this study was to summarize the major occupational safety and health challenges relating mostly to infusion therapy given in the home health care. This study is significant to the profession of nursing since it will cushion them from any safety risks they will encounter away from the safe environment of the hospital while enabling them to do their work. The main purpose of this study was to find out how the home-based care givers could prevent the substantial occupational safety and health hazards they experience through different model scenarios.

The second article talks about how the health care professionals have not received the workplace violence prevention programs. It talks about the courses that should be offered to the professionals either entry-level or experienced and how it applies to their work. The main objective of this study and describe the development of an on-line course for the health care workers. This on-line course is designed to be qualitative and it gives the workers an opportunity to acquire training anywhere they are. This study is significant to the profession of nursing since it will enable the nurses to train themselves and be able to prevent violence from occurring in their workplace hence keeping everyone safe. Does these two articles help to answer the question of whether the reduction of abuse and physical injury is down to the availability of violence prevention programs in their workplace.

In the first article, ten scenarios were used to illustrate the importance of the occupational safety and health risks that were identified during the interviews conducted and the focus groups used. The scenarios used varied from exposure to hazards, inadequate technology, unpredictable situations by the families, lack of assistance, and uncontrollable environmental conditions at the homes of the patients. These scenarios helped to determine if the implementation of the programs will help in curtailing violence against the nurses. In the second article, researchers worked on developing the content for an on-line course to e used by the health care professionals. The research included previous incidences that occurred in the profession and how they can be mitigated. This article helps to answer the PICOT question by identifying the various ways in which educating the health care givers can help prevent the effects of violence in the workplace.

In the first article, the comparison groups showed the different scenarios which illustrated the exposure risk factors reported by the home health nurses. The intervention showed how unpredictable and dynamic the homework environment is. This shows that the lack of violence programs in the home health care system will be detrimental to the safety of the care givers, patients, and the immediate support group. In the second article, there was a recognition that to be able to equip the health care workers better, they first need to know what to deal with, hence the curricula. The comparison groups were used to determine the various risk factors experienced by the health workers in the workplace. They also run interventions of how these risk factors can be avoided and controlled. The article tackled the issue of violence in the workplace and how it affects the work done and why it should be tackled to help reduce injuries and abuse.

In the first article, two different research studies were used to come up with the ten scenarios used to describe the occupational safety and health findings. Both of the research findings comprised of three phases that were used they included the presurvey qualitative phase, the cross-sectional survey, and finally the post survey qualitative phase. It included 29 focus groups comprised of home health care providers and interviews from 35 agency managers, trade unions, and labor union reps. The data obtained was used to interpret the findings and then recommend interventions. In the second article, an expert panel was used to conduct the research into the generation of a curriculum. The methods used were face-to-face meetings and conference calls. The data collected were analyzed by smaller groups known as grantee researchers and the final output sent back to the experts for review and further inputs. The research was conducted for a period of two years to get a full curriculum for the health givers.

These two methods are different since the second one is more intimate than the first one and the feedback given is return to them for further evaluation. In the first method more people can be reached than the second method due to the different dynamics. The feedback from the second method is more in-depth than the first which is more generalized. The first method used saves more time since the respondents are all in one place hence possible to get a quantity of opinions on multiple aspects. This method also has a disadvantage due to the small sample size which means it might not be the representation of the larger population. The second method will be able to accurately screen the respondents and keep their focus since the interviewer is in control of the interview. Also, because there is only one interviewee at a time hence attention will be on them at all times. This method tends to be expensive since it requires a large of staff to conduct the interviews for them to get data that can be used for analysis.

In the first article it was found out approximately 35% of nurses experienced at least one injury in their home health care stint. The risk factor of patient mobilization become more demanding when there is limited mobility hence resulting to back injuries to the care givers. There is a violence threat to the care givers from the patient or in the patient’s neighborhood. From the study, it was found out that the safety of the health care workers is linked to the safety of the patients. An evaluation of the patient and their environment should be conducted by a case manager before their case is accepted. This is done to protect both the patient and the care giver, and also to give specific safety recommendations. The agency mangers should teach safety regulations to their employees to curtail work related injuries.

In the second article, the findings were the several units contained in the on-line course for the prevention of workplace violence. The participants liked the technology used since it had the “resume-where-you-left-off” feature. This feature enables the user to be to multitask and still be able to return to where they left off in the course. The nurses’ voices videos were also liked by the participants since they showed relevant illustrations of workplace violence that are faced by the professionals. The findings also included case studies that provided the participants with different reactions from different situations in the health care settings.

Ethics are the set of written and unwritten rules that govern the behaviors and expectations of people. They are a core aspect in every research and should be followed. One of the ethical considerations is that the research should be valid in that they should address specific research questions. This will enable the conclusions found to corelate to the research questions asked. Validity of the research also demands that the methods used should relate to the research questions. Another ethical consideration is objectivity of the research to avoid biasness. This includes all aspects of the research while ensuring no groups are knowingly excluded from the research. Any personal interest that will affect the research should be disclosed to ensure the results are not biased.

In both articles, the researchers validated their research since they both addressed their respective research questions with the methods used and the resulting conclusions. In the first article objectivity was met since the researcher wanted to know about the safety of the home health care providers. The researcher wanted to know the risk factor associated and how to minimize them. In the second article, the researcher met objectivity since they were able to achieve program development of an on-line course. This course is meant to help the nurses in prevention of violence in the workplace. The researcher was even able to give future recommendations on the way forward for the program.

From both the articles, it was found out the availability of programs that help in the prevention of violence in the workplaces of health care providers did reduce the risk of injury and abuse. It doesn’t matter if it is an emergency department setting or a home health setting, the risk of exposure is the same in both. When violence prevention programs are not implemented, then the risk of injuries and abuse on the workers increase. There is need for the implementation of these programs from the required authorities.

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