Safety in care work is practical and can be learned within a few hours of training. In the meantime, here are 5 key areas to learn before your first day of work and to go back to as needed.
Protect Your Back During Moves
Manual handling of clients and their possessions can cause the most injuries in care work. Always bend at the knee when moving objects or clients, keep the client close to your body at all times and use a handling belt or a slide sheet if available. Never twist at the waist while lifting an object.
Follow Lone Working Protocols
If you are visiting clients in their homes you should have a system of checks in place while alone working. This could be a scheduled call at a set time or the use of an app. Your employer should inform you of the time of the check and you should report if there are any delays and inform your employer of the reason for any longer visits.
Manage Challenging Behaviour Calmly If you are looking for Care Assistant Jobs Dublin, see caremark.ie/job-opportunities/care-assistant-jobs-dublin.
When responding to a situation of challenging behaviour, remain low, keep a straight line of sight and ensure that there is a safe way for you to leave the area. Use the steps for de-escalation set out by your employer and do not attempt to come up with your own solutions. If you feel that a situation is becoming unsafe then step back from it and call for assistance.
Control Infection on Every Visit
Wash your hands with soap and water before you visit the person and after you have left them, between tasks if your hands are going to be in contact with clinical waste such as dressings or between tasks that involve contact with different people, and follow your employer’s procedures for disposal of clinical waste. The HSE website publishes health and wellbeing at work information for workers on occupational health rights.
Report Incidents Straight Away
After any incident or near miss, fill out an incident report form on the same day as the incident, while details of what happened are fresh. This will help to protect you and also enable your employer to try and prevent the same incident occurring in the future.
The required safety training for each job is listed also.
