Safety at work Archives

Bullying at work- health and safety issue

Bullying at work is a health and safety issue

Employers have a duty of care to protect their employees both mentally and physically in the workplace. This is a workplace and human relations issue and needs to be treated very seriously. It has been identified as dangerous and can lead to health and safety problems.

Bullying in the workplace can be described differently in various forms. The Health and Safety Authority describes it the following:”repeated inappropriate behaviour, direct or indirect, whether verbal, physical or otherwise, conducted by one or more persons against another or others, at the place of work and/or in the course of employment, which could reasonably be regarded as undermining the individual‘s right to dignity at work.”

Here are some examples of the types of bullying that happen in the workplace

Purposely undermining someone
Targeting someone for special negative treatment
Manipulation of an individual‘s reputation
Social exclusion or isolation
Intimidation
Aggressive or obscene language
Jokes that are obviously offensive to one individual by spoken word or email
Intrusion by pestering, spying and stalking
Unreasonable assignments to duties which are obviously unfavourable to one individual
Repeated requests with impossible deadline or impossible tasks

Employers need to be vigilant and know that individuals who are accused of bullying have employment rights too. They have to follow the correct procedure.

Bully Culture

Where a bullying culture has been identified, (through a number of complaints being received, for instance) employers must take reasonable measures to prevent incidents of bullying occurring (through awareness raising and training as well as reacting speedily to resolve issues early/progress investigations and/or initiate control measures). When and if they bullying occurs, employers should prevent the risk of injury to the health of employees worsening by providing and implementing support and assistance throughout the process, and reviewing and monitoring the environment afterwards, as far as is reasonable..

Managers and supervisors have a particular responsibility to promote dignity in the workplace for all. They should be alert to the possibility of bullying behaviour and be familiar with the policies and procedures for dealing with allegations of bullying. Their behaviour may be modelled by others, as it may be considered acceptable. That’s why managers, supervisors and those in authority should be aware of their own behaviour at work and not engage in improper conduct in any form.

If you are being bullied in the work or want to talk to a someone confidentially, contact us and we can give you help and support advice.

Joining the Dots – Child Friendly Healthcare in Hospitals

Joining the Dots Survey Results

The Children’s Hospital Group Board and the Ombudsman for Children’s Office are pleased to launch the results of the survey Joining the Dots: Connecting voices for child-friendly healthcare in hospital.

Joining the Dots has been an exciting opportunity to hear, for the first time, from children and young people receiving care and treatment in the three hospitals about what they feel is working well and where there is room for improvement.

Joining the Dots is a joint initiative by the Children’s Hospital Group Board and the Ombudsman for Children’s Office with the three children’s hospitals – Our Lady’s Children’s Hospital, Crumlin, Temple Street Children’s University Hospital and the National Children’s Hospital, Tallaght University Hospital – to hear the views of children, young people, parents/guardians and hospital staff on the delivery of services to children and young people in hospital.

This joint initiative sought participants’ views on a range of issues that relate to children’s rights under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and different rights that children have in healthcare settings, including hospitals.

Survey

The results of the surveys completed by children, young people, parents/guardians and hospital staff will help the children’s hospitals to identify what changes could give children and young people a better experience of being in hospital. The survey results will also support ongoing work to plan and design paediatric services for the new children’s hospital and two paediatric outpatients and urgent care centres at Connolly and Tallaght Hospitals.

The Joining the Dots survey took place in the Emergency Departments, Inpatient Departments and Outpatient Departments of the three children’s hospitals between July and August 2017. In total, the participants were;

2,530 children (aged 6-11 years)
Young people (aged 12-17 years)
Parents/guardians
Hospital staff and management

The surveys were distributed by staff in each of the three children’s hospitals and by Children in Hospital Ireland volunteers.

Results

Welcoming the publication of the results, the Ombudsman for Children, Dr Niall Muldoon said: “Joining the Dots is an innovative initiative because it is the first time in Ireland that children and young people have been asked for their views as service users on a wide range of issues relating to their rights in hospital settings.”

Dr Muldoon continued;

“The results of the Joining the Dots survey provide a welcome indicator of the quality of acute paediatric healthcare services in Dublin: we now have a much clearer picture of what is working well and where there is room for improvement. Joining the Dots is a child-centred quality assurance tool and I warmly welcome that the Children’s Hospital Group is working with the HSE to examine the feasibility of implementing this initiative in acute paediatric services outside Dublin.”

Commenting on the results of this first survey of acute healthcare services for children Eilísh Hardiman, Chief Executive, Children’s Hospital Group said;

“We wish to thank all who made this survey possible, with a very special thank you to those who provided their invaluable insights into our health services. This feedback will become the backbone on which we will shape our design for acute paediatric services delivery.”

The CEOs, Directors of Nursing and clinical staff from the three children’s hospitals also welcomed the results of this initiative and said;

“We would like to acknowledge how important these results are to all our staff and services. We will work hard to identify and implement the vital improvements that are in our capability to achieve. Thank you to everyone who made this feedback possible.”

Issues being sought

The wide range of issues we sought participants’ views on were grouped under 8 sections:

Getting good quality care
Being treated equally and fairly
Rest, play, leisure and learning
Information and participation
Safety and environment
Protection
Pain management
Final comments

The results of the questionnaires highlight a range of good practices as well as signposting areas for potential improvement.

Over 3,000 comments were made by children, young people and parents/guardians. 65% of the comments were positive and 35% of the comments suggested areas where improvements could be made.

Eight out of ten of the positive comments were about the care delivered by hospital staff to children and young people.

Among the issues raised in comments about room for improvement were: waiting times for treatments and procedures (26%), building infrastructure (16%), parking (14%) and food (9%).

The Children’s Hospital Group is working with the HSE to explore the feasibility of rolling out this initiative in acute paediatric healthcare services across Ireland. It has also established a Quality and Patient Safety Group which will take responsibility for the development of a quality improvement action plan based on the areas for improvement identified by the survey results.

What is Safe Pass?

Safe Pass at Work (Not currently an Online Course)

Safe Pass is a one day safety awareness programme aimed at construction workers. The aims of the programme are to raise the standard of safety awareness in the construction industry and that all construction workers after completing the one day awareness programme can make a positive contribution to the prevention of accidents and ill health while working on the site.

The Safe Pass programme is operated and managed by Solas. www.solas.ie

SafePass is a general awareness programme and does not negate the duty of the employer under the Act in regards to the provision of information, instruction and training to enable the person to carry out their work safely.

Who needs to do Safe Pass awareness training?

Under the Safety Health and Welfare at Work (Construction) Regulations 2013 Safe Pass / Safety Awareness Programmes only applies to –

(a) Craft and general construction workers,

(b) Persons undertaking on-site security work, and

The Health and Safety Authority in conjunction with the Construction Advisory Committee have produced a summary guide of the categories of persons to whom Safe Pass does and does not apply.

Summary checklist for Safe Pass

Category of personnel involved in Construction Projects	Is Safe Pass or equivalent mandatory	Category of personnel involved in Construction Projects	Is Safe Pass or equivalent mandatory
Craft Workers	Yes	Project Managers/Site Agents not involved in construction activities	No
Apprentices	Yes	Site Managers not involved in construction activities	No
General Construction Workers	Yes	Safety Advisor’s or Safety Officers not involved in construction work	No
Working Chargehands	Yes
On-site Security Workers	Yes	PSDP/PSCS	No
Contractors Drivers On-site	Yes	Inspectors/Consultants	No
Delivery Drivers On-site e.g. concrete trucks	Yes	Clients & Client Reps	No
Students on Placement on site	Yes
Delivery Drivers Not On-site e.g. delivering to compounds, canteens,offices	No	Supervised Visitors	No
Canteen Staff	No	Archaeologists	No (see below)
Site Office Staff	No	Sales Representatives	No
Architects, Surveyors, Engineers	No	Visitors to Show Houses	No

What should I know about fire safety?

We are talking today about fire safety because it’s that time of the year again when temperatures start to drop, and you find yourself turning on your stove and cranking up the heat. Being up to date with the fire safety procedure is essential. To protect your family, you need to take the following steps to help prevent fires in the home—and to keep everyone safe in the event of one.

Install and Maintain Smoke Alarms:

Smoke alarms give you an early warning of a fire, giving you time to escape with your children before your house is filled with flames and smoke. Most fatal fires occur at night, when people are sleeping, so an early warning is crucial. Smoke alarms can cut the risk of death by 50 percent.

How Many Smoke Alarms Do You Need?

The amount of smoke alarms you should have depends on the size of your house. Bryant recommends a minimum of one alarm per level of your house. If your house is multi-leveled, he says you should have one at the top of the stairs, in every cooking area and in the living room. You should also make sure that there is an alarm outside every room that a person sleeps in.

Test your Smoke Alarms

Make sure that smoke alarms are in order and everyone in your family is familiar with its sound. Educate them that this particular sound means danger and they must evacuate the building immediately.

Change Smoke Alarms batteries

Remind yourself to change smoke alarms batteries one or twice a year. Give it fresh batteries and your smoke alarm will stay awake and watch for fire while you are sleeping.

How to escape during a fire.

It is always important to make a family escape plan by highlighting two escape routes for every room and a safe meeting place for all family members to gather outside of your home. This worksheet offers a handy way to make a fire escape plan for your family. Once you’ve established your escape plan, practice it regularly with your family. Choose a meeting place outside, so you would know that everyone has gotten out safely.

Fire is a dangerous thing but if you are fully prepared and have a plan in place it could help you to save your life and lives of your loved ones. Do not ignore safety procedures make sure that you are aware of the danger and comply with safety regulations.

Our Fire Safety training course can help you to control the risk of fire and trains participants how to act safely in case of emergency, get more information here.