OHS, Personnel Today & QuantiFERON

A bit about the magazine Personnel Today;

Top Ten Facts

1. Personnel Today was first published in 1988.
2. Personnel Today is the only weekly magazine for the human resources market.
3. Personnel Today reaches 47,655 readers each week.
4. Personnel Today gives practical business information, features and benchmarks in an accessible format.
5. Personnel Today is recognised at the highest levels of government and industry.
6. Ptod.com has the latest jobs in the HR industry.
7. Ptod.com offers up to the minute HR news.
8. Ptod.com offers careers advice and a comprehensive directory of suppliers of HR products and services.

Both Personnel Today and Occupational Health are published by the Reed Information Group, UK and both magazines have published an article dealing with immunisation and HCWs including TB

Once a policy has been accepted then thought can be given to a protocol that will address the issues of delivery of the focus of that policy: the what, when, where, by whom, and how often, and whether any post-immunisation biological monitoring or special surveillance processes are needed (serology). For example, in March 2007, the Department of Health published a document1 making it compulsory for NHS employers' to screen all new healthcare workers for Tuberculosis (TB) and the blood-borne viruses hepatitis B, hepatitis C, and HIV.

...Any nurse practitioner involved in the collection of biological monitoring samples must be aware of, and if necessary be reminded of, the need for 'universal (standard) precautions'9 when collecting samples or handling vaccines, especially live vaccines - for example, Yellow Fever.

Recently, the recommendations for screening for TB have changed from using the Heaf test to using the Mantoux test.3 However, the Mantoux test in the OH setting is very time consuming as it requires the employee to attend two appointments - one for the administration of the test, and one for the reading of the skin reaction 48 to 72 hours later,6 and there is a very real issue of patient non-compliance in attending the second appointment.

To address this, several employers and universities are now using either the T-spot7 or the Quantiferon TB Gold8 blood tests. These new blood tests are relatively expensive in comparison to the Mantoux test. However, apart from being able to identify latent as well as active TB, they save money by reducing the overall number of OH appointments needed, and by reducing the amount of time employees are out of the workplace.

These tests also have the added advantage that, by virtue of being a blood test, once the blood is taken you have ensured 100% compliance. Furthermore, they do not rely on the subjective reading of a skin reaction.