Objective: Students in health profession education programs were severely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic at both didactic and clinical training levels. The purpose for this American Society for Clinical Pathology Board of Certification (ASCP BOC) study was to determine the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on graduates. This study represents the perspectives of laboratory professional graduates who sat for the BOC certification in their respective professional disciplines.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: Health professions education programs were severely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic at clinical and didactic training levels. The purpose for this American Society for Clinical Pathology-Board of Certification (BOC) study was to determine the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the graduates who sat for BOC certification in their respective professional disciplines from the perspective of program directors (PDs). A separate article will be published on the graduates' perspective.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSoft surfaces, including textiles are found throughout healthcare settings. Pathogens can survive for long periods of time on textiles, and can be transferred to and from the skin. Antimicrobial fabrics are used as an engineering control to prevent infection.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Home care aides perform personal care and homemaking services in client homes, including cleaning and disinfection (C&D). Although C&D are performed to remove soil and dust, they are increasingly performed for infection prevention. Many C&D products contain respiratory irritants.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPerspect Public Health
July 2016
Background: Research in several professional fields has demonstrated that delays (time lapse) in taking certification examinations may result in poorer performance by examinees. Thirteen states and/or territories require licensure for laboratory personnel. A core component of licensure is passing a certification exam.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFLittle is known about student nurse laundering practices. Student nurses swabbed their scrub tops after clinical and after laundering, and they completed a laundry survey; 13.5% of students wore the same scrub more than once, and few followed recommended guidelines by using hot water (20%) or bleach (5.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn the student laboratory, 10% bleach (sodium hypochlorite) is used to disinfect benches before and after work, and when a spill occurs. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Guidelines recommend diluting bleach daily. In a student laboratory setting, the organisms in use are known and may include only selected standard bacteria.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFContext: Daily supervisory review is a common practice in microbiology laboratories; however, there are no publications describing errors corrected by this practice.
Objective: To determine (1) the correction rates for routinely reviewed positive cultures, (2) the correction rates for negative cultures, and (3) the types of corrections that are found, including the number with potential clinical significance.
Design: We prospectively assessed errors identified during culture report review for all positive (10-month period) and negative (1-month period) cultures at a single, university-based clinical microbiology laboratory in the United States.
Am J Clin Pathol
January 2006
We used a computer-based competency assessment tool for Gram stain interpretation to assess the performance of 278 laboratory staff from 40 laboratories on 40 multiple-choice questions. We report test reliability, mean scores, median, item difficulty, discrimination, and analysis of the highest- and lowest-scoring questions. The questions were reliable (KR-20 coefficient, 0.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: The usefulness of standardized test scores as an admission requirement for the University of Washington Medical Technology Program (UWMTP) was evaluated. Scores from the Allied Health Professions Admissions Test (AHPAT) were used.
Design: Student data (n = 183) were analyzed and evaluated statistically using Pearson correlation and Cox proportional hazards regression analyses.