Imagine you travelling at night driving a car, you come across a red light at traffic junction. You are the only vehicle at this junction and you are tempted to stop due to the fact that it is red. You look well across all directions. Definitely there is no other vehicle. You then are tempted to go past the red light. If you know that there can be traffic cameras and you might receive a letter with fine and points on your license, then you suppress the temptation of crossing the red light, as you know it is only few seconds before it goes green.
The scenario i have given is a common sense approach. Even though the common sense tells you to override the red signal as there are no traffic, the regulatory fear of traffic camera stops you doing so.
If you had read my previous blog of hazard, risk and incident, then you understand that another moving vehicle or pedestrian is the hazard for you in the car. The risk is very low as it is middle of the night and you reduce the risk by looking well all around. you think the chance of an incident of an accident is so low that you want to take the chance and you are tempted to cross at the red signal.
As the society does not want you to take even that chance, the traffic camera makes you decide to stop.
But then this logic does not seem to work in India while you are driving. One of my patient i am treating at the moment is a handicapped polio patient who was driving a two wheeler. he came to a traffic signal where the signal was red. he duly followed the above logic and decided to stop.
He then landed at our hospital with a fracture of the leg and shoulder.
Why? Why and Why ! these are the questions he asked me and you are probably asking as well
Wait for my blog and i am sure if you are driving in India you already know why
Regards
Chockalingam
Monday, October 24, 2011
Monday, October 10, 2011
Risk, Hazard and Incident, apply to your work place wherever you are!! part 2
Hazards are everywhere. A knife is a hazard. A needle in a hospital is a hazard. A gun is a hazard. Everyone of what i have given as examples are necessary in some walk of life.
In Other Words, We cannot have a hospital without a knife or a needle as they are needed to treat a patient. A Gun is an essential tool for someone working in the army or high security police for example.
However if the hazard is in a persons hand's or at a time or in an situation where it is not expected to be, then the hazard can cause an incident. For example a kitchen knife in a child's hand, a gun in the hands of anti social, or water on a mosaic or marble floor.
However not every time the hazard is in this situation will cause an incident. There you have to calculate the risk of such an incident. For example not every time you travel in a road, one is involved in an accident. you have to view every object in the line of your travel such as a bus, lorry or even a dog on the road as hazard.
When travelling, you take a risk by crossing these hazards to reach your destination. You minimise the risk by driving slowly, taking extra care at nights, not drinking alcohol before you drive and so forth.
However you do not want to take any risks in some areas such as not giving a knife to a child as the risk though may be small, is too much to take.
Back to wherever you work, you start looking at things with a note of
1. Are there hazards
2. What is the exposure
3 What is the risk
4 Should i take the risk or not
5. Can i reduce the risk or avoid the risk altogether by avoiding the exposure altogether
Hope it makes sense
It would certainly make sense if you start applying.
You then ask the cleaner to put a notice that the floor is wet when he is cleaning to warn the people walking by that there is a small risk of falling and they have to walk more carefully.
All of us would put our waste in a bin and dispose appropriately to reduce the breeding of bugs which then would cause infection and so on and so forth
Regards
Chockalingam
In Other Words, We cannot have a hospital without a knife or a needle as they are needed to treat a patient. A Gun is an essential tool for someone working in the army or high security police for example.
However if the hazard is in a persons hand's or at a time or in an situation where it is not expected to be, then the hazard can cause an incident. For example a kitchen knife in a child's hand, a gun in the hands of anti social, or water on a mosaic or marble floor.
However not every time the hazard is in this situation will cause an incident. There you have to calculate the risk of such an incident. For example not every time you travel in a road, one is involved in an accident. you have to view every object in the line of your travel such as a bus, lorry or even a dog on the road as hazard.
When travelling, you take a risk by crossing these hazards to reach your destination. You minimise the risk by driving slowly, taking extra care at nights, not drinking alcohol before you drive and so forth.
However you do not want to take any risks in some areas such as not giving a knife to a child as the risk though may be small, is too much to take.
Back to wherever you work, you start looking at things with a note of
1. Are there hazards
2. What is the exposure
3 What is the risk
4 Should i take the risk or not
5. Can i reduce the risk or avoid the risk altogether by avoiding the exposure altogether
Hope it makes sense
It would certainly make sense if you start applying.
You then ask the cleaner to put a notice that the floor is wet when he is cleaning to warn the people walking by that there is a small risk of falling and they have to walk more carefully.
All of us would put our waste in a bin and dispose appropriately to reduce the breeding of bugs which then would cause infection and so on and so forth
Regards
Chockalingam
Thursday, October 6, 2011
Risk, Hazard and Incident, apply to your work place wherever you are!!
Incident is an event or occurance. We talk of incidents as unplanned or unexpected events in a hospital set up. We record them diligently and analyse them to ensure such events do not recur for improvement of patient care.
Patients in India always ask me one thing when i suggest a treatment say for example surgery. It is this " risk onnum illiye" meaning "there is no risk in this, is there?". Once i had explained infection as one of the risks in treating a fracture to one of the wife of a patient who had treatment under me.
At two weeks when the sutures were being removed, the wife asked me with real worry "there is no infection, is there?". One has to remember that this wife was one of the staff member of my hospital itself. Now the point of matter is no one wants to take a risk in undergoing a treatment.
Yet treatment has risks. If someone tells you that there is no risk, what they are really doing is to reassure you as an worried patient or relative. They cannot really mean it. Yes this is true.
It is true in real life in all walks of life and in all situations. If you look at travelling in a road in India, you carry huge risk of having an accident. Does this mean that you do not travel and stay in the house all the time. No you do travel and you take risks.
But what then is the issue. It is in knowing the risk analysis of a situation. In other words, if somehow you know how much risk you are taking, then you may decide, yes it is worth it or not.
Is quantification alone enough?. What would you accept for example, one percent, five percent or less? Because the reason you are taking the risk may push you to take a larger than five percent risk as opposed to taking less
Say for Example, one has cancer and the surgeon says, have surgery. The surgery carries risk, but then not having surgery carries far greater risk. Hence one goes with the option of having surgery.
But what can everyone do in a place wherever they are. You control the risk by being aware of the hazards and avoid the exposure. If you cannot avoid then control the dose of exposure
Stay with me and
I will post in my next blog
Regards
Chockalingam
Patients in India always ask me one thing when i suggest a treatment say for example surgery. It is this " risk onnum illiye" meaning "there is no risk in this, is there?". Once i had explained infection as one of the risks in treating a fracture to one of the wife of a patient who had treatment under me.
At two weeks when the sutures were being removed, the wife asked me with real worry "there is no infection, is there?". One has to remember that this wife was one of the staff member of my hospital itself. Now the point of matter is no one wants to take a risk in undergoing a treatment.
Yet treatment has risks. If someone tells you that there is no risk, what they are really doing is to reassure you as an worried patient or relative. They cannot really mean it. Yes this is true.
It is true in real life in all walks of life and in all situations. If you look at travelling in a road in India, you carry huge risk of having an accident. Does this mean that you do not travel and stay in the house all the time. No you do travel and you take risks.
But what then is the issue. It is in knowing the risk analysis of a situation. In other words, if somehow you know how much risk you are taking, then you may decide, yes it is worth it or not.
Is quantification alone enough?. What would you accept for example, one percent, five percent or less? Because the reason you are taking the risk may push you to take a larger than five percent risk as opposed to taking less
Say for Example, one has cancer and the surgeon says, have surgery. The surgery carries risk, but then not having surgery carries far greater risk. Hence one goes with the option of having surgery.
But what can everyone do in a place wherever they are. You control the risk by being aware of the hazards and avoid the exposure. If you cannot avoid then control the dose of exposure
Stay with me and
I will post in my next blog
Regards
Chockalingam
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