Scheduled periodic facility inspection round by the Safety Committee and the Medical Superintendent are among the most important and effective measures for prevention and control of safety hazards. Safety Committee should carry out the inspection every quarter and the MS every six months.
The facility inspections should be carried out by the Chairman of the Committee accompanied by the Chief maintenance engineer, the Security officer, the Fire safety supervisor, the House keeping supervisor, the Nursing Superintendent and one or two other members by rotation.
Half yearly inspection rounds by the MS should include all the above and the Heads of Department within their respective departments.
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The inspections should be preceded by a written self assessment report about the current safety hazards and the safety level, by the department heads.
The scope of inspections would include survey of every nook and corner of the entire facility to detect, assess the hazard Potential in r/o every possible hazard reported or not reported. It should specially check the hazards known/reported or occurred, against which corrective measures have been implemented in the past.
It is a time consuming process and may take 2 to 3 days in an average sized hospital. Much time can be saved, if an area/department wise check list can be prepared enlisting all the known hazards in those areas.
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The advantage is that while doing the inspection, the Probability of Occurrence (PO) and the Damage Potential (DP) can also is worked out on the spot in r/o every hazard, by consensus and noted on the check list along with other actions to be taken and the time frame required.
Benefits of Facility Inspection: A major advantage of the facility inspection rounds, if carried out sincerely and in detail is that every deficiency/hazard comes out in the open and nothing is missed.
It can facilitate speedy allocation of priorities, allocation of funds and implementation of corrective measures.
Further, since the inspection is done after the departments have already done a detailed exercise even on technical aspects, spot decisions can be taken on many aspects for amendment of SOPs (in case of system failure) or the training of staff (in case of human failure).
Inspection report:
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Every inspection must be followed by the detailed report of observations, causes of hazards, actions recommended, funds allocated (where required), SOPs changed (where required) and the other corrective measures implemented.
It should also include by name/designation the officer responsible for implementation, the desired level of improvement, the time frame for implementation and review thereafter.
However, if during the half yearly inspection, there is a shortage of time, then a priority list of hazardous areas/activities may be prepared and inspected on priority, followed by other areas.