Occupational English Test - Reading Practice
📖 6 Short Extracts | Questions 25-30For questions 25-30, choose the answer (A, B or C) which fits best according to the text.
Instruction Manual: Digital Automatic Blood Pressure Monitor
Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC)
With the increased use of portable electronic devices, medical equipment may be susceptible to electromagnetic interference. This may result in incorrect operation of the medical device and create a potentially unsafe situation. In order to regulate the requirements for EMC, with the aim of preventing unsafe product situations, the EN60601-1-2 standard defines the levels of immunity to electromagnetic interferences as well as maximum levels of electromagnetic emissions for medical devices. This medical device conforms to EN60601-1-2:2001 for both immunity and emissions. Nevertheless, care should be taken to avoid the use of the monitor within 7 metres of cellphones or other devices generating strong electrical or electromagnetic fields.
NG feeding tubes
Displacement of nasogastric (NG) feeding tubes can have serious implications if undetected. Incorrectly positioned tubes leave patients vulnerable to the risks of regurgitation and respiratory aspiration. It is crucial to differentiate between gastric and respiratory placement on initial insertion to prevent potentially fatal pulmonary complications. Insertion and care of an NG tube should therefore only be carried out by a registered doctor or nurse who has undergone theoretical and practical training and is deemed competent or is supervised by someone competent. Assistant practitioners and other unregistered staff must never insert NG tubes or be involved in the initial confirmation of safe NG tube position.
'Right Patient, Right Blood' Assessments
The administration of blood can have significant morbidity and mortality. Following the introduction of the 'Right Patient, Right Blood' safety policy, all staff involved in the transfusion process must be competency assessed. To ensure the safe administration of blood components to the intended patient, all staff must be aware of their responsibilities in line with professional standards.
Staff must ensure that if they take any part in the transfusion process, their competency assessment is updated every three years. All staff are responsible for ensuring that they attend the mandatory training identified for their roles. Relevant training courses are clearly identified in Appendix 1 of the Mandatory Training Matrix.
Chaperones: Guidelines for Good Practice
A patient may specifically request a chaperone or in certain circumstances may nominate one, but it will not always be the case that a chaperone is required. It is often a question of using professional judgement to assess an individual situation. If a chaperone is offered and declined, this must be clearly documented in the patient's record, along with any relevant discussion. The chaperone should only be present for the physical examination and should be in a position to see what the healthcare professional undertaking the examination/investigation is doing. The healthcare professional should wait until the chaperone has left the room/cubicle before discussion takes place on any aspect of the patient's care, unless the patient specifically requests the chaperone to remain.
Annual Medication Review
To give all patients an annual medication review is an ideal to strive for. In the meantime there is an argument for targeting all clinical medication reviews to those patients likely to benefit most.
Our guidelines state that "at least a level 2 medication review will occur", i.e. the minimum standard is a treatment review of medicines with the full notes but not necessarily with the patient present. However, the guidelines go on to say that "all patients should have the chance to raise questions and highlight problems about their medicines" and that any changes resulting from the review are "agreed with the patient".
It also states that GP practices are expected to minimise waste in prescribing and avoid ineffective treatments.
Advisory Email: Safe use of opioids
In August, an alert was issued on the safe use of opioids in hospitals. This reported the incidence of respiratory depression among post-surgical patients to an average 0.5% - thus for every 5,000 surgical patients, 25 will experience respiratory depression. Failure to recognise respiratory depression and institute timely intervention can lead to cardiopulmonary arrest, resulting in brain injury or death. A retrospective multi-centre study of 14,720 cardiopulmonary arrest cases showed that 44% were respiratory related and more than 35% occurred on the general care floor. It is therefore recommended that post-operative patients now have continuous monitoring, instead of spot checks, of both oxygenation and ventilation.