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IOM Releases Report on PPE for Healthcare Workers during an Influenza Pandemic

By Jennifer Nuzzo, September 21, 2007

On September 18, 2007, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) released a report entitled Preparing for an Influenza Pandemic: Personal Protective Equipment for Healthcare Workers, which was completed at the request of the National Personal Protective Technology Laboratory (NPPTL) at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH). The report recommendations are “intended to serve as a framework and a catalyst for a national PPE [personal protective equipment] action plan that is an integral part of the overall national plan for an influenza pandemic.”1

The IOM committee noted that while healthcare workers “will be on the front lines delivering care to patients and preventing further spread of the disease” during a pandemic, “efforts to appropriately protect healthcare workers from illness or from infecting their families and their patients are greatly hindered by the paucity of data on the transmission of influenza and the challenges associated with training and equipping healthcare workers with effective personal protective equipment.” As a result of these knowledge gaps, the IOM committee concluded that “it is not possible at the present time to definitely inform healthcare workers about what PPE is critical and what level of protection this equipment will provide in a pandemic.” To that end, the committee determined that there “is an urgent need to address the lack of preparedness regarding effective PPE for use in an influenza pandemic.”1

The IOM committee identified three critical areas that require “expeditious research and policy action”:

1. “Influenza transmission research should become an immediate and short-term research priority so that effective prevention and control strategies can be developed and refined.”
2. “Employer and employee commitment to worker safety and appropriate use of PPE should be strengthened.”
3. “An integrated effort is needed to understand the PPE requirements of the worker and to develop and utilize innovative materials and technologies to create the next generation of PPE capable of meeting these needs.” This would include “increasing the use of post-marketing field testing in the pre-market phase and conducting thorough post-marketing evaluations,” as well as creating “rigorous federal regulatory and testing requirements.”1

In each of the three critical areas, the IOM committee recommended specific actions at the local, national and international level that should be taken promptly to “fill the numerous gaps in preparing for pandemic influenza.” In the preface of the report, Committee Chair Lewis Goldfrank wrote that such “expeditious efforts are need to advance this action plan so that healthcare workers will feel secure enough to leave their homes, come to work, work effectively, and return to their loved ones during an influenza pandemic.”

References

1. Goldfrank LR, Liverman CT, eds. Preparing for an Influenza Pandemic: Personal Protective Equipment for Healthcare Workers. Washington, DC: Institute of Medicine, The National Academy of Sciences; 2007. http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=11980. Accessed September 20, 2007.