Posted By Eddie Regarding patient handling risks, what reasons would you give for nurses' failure to carry out manual handling risk assessment? I suspect that it is sometimes due to pressure of work, or not being familiar with the documents/assessment tool/process perhaps due to lack of training. Are there any other reasons?

Posted By John Webster Eddie, Paul's response, whilst technically correct, completely ignores the reality of the situation. It is part of the duties and responsibilities of nurses that they assess patients, both on referral/admission and periodically thereafter. This applies equally to all, whether they be in-patients, day-patients or being cared for at home by the Community Nurse. By nature, nurses tend to give priority to the needs of the patient, often at the expense of their own needs. To this add recurring problems such as long hours, short staffing and under funding in many areas and it will come as no surprise that nurses will complete those parts of the assessment which they feel have a bearing on patient welfare and treatment, and skip the ever increasing piles of forms that they don't. Yes, managers have the responsibility to ensure that all the various parts of the assessment are completed, but this, surely, is the point of the question. Managers and Safety Advisers alike need to find the underlying causes for a particular organisational policy and proceedures being ignored. I am sure you will get replies like "can't be bothered" "all we seem to do is fill in more paperwork" "we managed quite well without it before" " I can see he is 26 stones without having to fill out an assessment" etc etc etc. As always, it is never easy to persuade others that what you are doing is for their own good. Just keep chipping away, and one day, little by little, the message will get through. By all means review the procedures and keep them simple, review the forms and cut out the repetition and the unnecessary, but don't let up on the training and the message. How long did it take Jimmy Saville to convince us to "Clunk-click every trip" ...... best part of thirty years!!! John

Posted By Paul Craythorne John, In response to your statement that whilst I was technically correct, I completely ignored the reality of the situation. I am fully aware of the reality of the situation having worked for a Local Authority and therefore had many dealings with Social Services staff who find themselves in similar situations. I merely kept my response short and without complication because as an ex-enforcement officer, I could not 'technically' accept that the many excuses used by nurses were an acceptable reason for failure to carry out risk assessment. I do, however, sympathise with Eddie and would urge him to persevere through ongoing education and awareness. I also accept that because of the job sector he is in, that he will probably never get 100% co-operation from staff. Regards, Paul

Posted By Eddie My thanks go to the people who took the trouble to respond to my posting. It was in preparation for a presentation to nursing students on manual handling risk assessment. The students confirmed my suspicions that pressure of work, and not being familiar with the documents/assessment tool/process perhaps due to lack of training, were major contributory factors. Eddie.