Percent of health facilities with adequate supplies for universal precautions Percent of health facilities with adequate supplies for universal precautions Definition: The number of facilities sufficiently equipped for universal precautions. Universal precautions refer to the measures taken within the health care setting to prevent HIV transmission with the guiding principle that one should assume that all blood, blood products, and bodily fluids are potentially infectious. The minimum requirements for universal precautions are: Facilities for frequent hand-washing; Availability of gloves for all procedures involving contact with blood and other bodily fluids; Availability of protective clothing; Safe handling of sharp objects; Safe disposal of waste materials; Appropriate cleaning, disinfecting, and sterilizing of medical instruments; Proper handling of corpses; and Appropriate handling of workplace injuries (UNHCR, 1999). This indicator is calculated as: (# of health facilities with adequate supplies to carry out universal precautions / # of camp service delivery points) x 100 Each service delivery point (SDP) must define adequate supplies based on the number of potential exposures. Data Requirement(s): Information on number of SDPs within the refugee camp that have adequate supplies for universal precautions, and information on the total number of camp SDPs Data Source(s): Inventory and commodities report of camp SDPs Purpose: This indicator measures the effectiveness of management and distribution systems for supplies related to universal precautions. Those in charge must emphasize universal precautions against the spread of HIV/AIDS within the health care setting during the first meeting of health coordinators of the refugee camp. Under the pressure of an emergency situation, the field staff may be tempted to take short cuts in procedures and thus jeopardize the safety of patients and staff. Staff must respect universal precautions. Issue(s): Because “adequate supplies” must be defined by each SDP, the inability to have a standard definition because of each SDP’s unique client load may pose a problem if the SDP underestimates how many supplies they actually need. Keywords: access, health system strengthening (HSS), quality, commodity, emergency Related content Health System Strengthening Access to Sexual and Reproductive Health Services Quality of Care in Sexual and Reproductive Health Services Filed under: access, commodity, emergency, Family Planning, FP, FP/RH, health system strengthening, Indicators, quality, Reproductive Health, RH
