Ensuring Healthcare Worker Safety When Handling Hazardous Drugs.

Ensuring Healthcare Worker Safety When Handling Hazardous Drugs. Oncol Nurs Forum. 2019 Nov 01;46(6):647-648 Authors: Abstract Hazardous drugs (HDs) are chemicals that demonstrate one or more of the following characteristics: carcinogenicity, genotoxicity, teratogenicity, reproductive toxicity, or organ toxicity. In addition, newer drugs with a structural or toxicity profile that mimics an agent known to be hazardous by one of the aforementioned criteria also should be treated as such. Any HD-handling activity can result in exposure for healthcare workers, as documented in a multitude of case reports and studies throughout the medical literature. Exposure to HDs has been associated with acute symptoms (e.g., nasal sores, hair loss, skin rash), adverse reproductive outcomes (e.g., infertility, miscarriage), genetic changes (e.g., chromosomal aberrations, sister-chromatid exchanges), and an increased occurrence of cancer. PMID: 31626619 [PubMed - in process]
Source: Oncology Nursing Forum - Category: Nursing Tags: Oncol Nurs Forum Source Type: research