Abstract
In February 2010, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) received a confidential employee request for a Health Hazard Evaluation (HHE) at a veterinary teaching hospital that provides routine care and oncology services to large and small animals. Canines and felines constitute the majority of the oncology department’s patients. Veterinary hospital employees were concerned about adverse health effects from the use of chemotherapy drugs in the oncology department. In 2004, NIOSH released an Alert regarding occupational exposures to antineoplastic and other hazardous drugs that are used in health care settings. Hazardous drugs were defined in the NIOSH Alert as having “specific health effects (such as skin rashes, cancer, and reproductive effects) and high toxicity at low doses.”(1) The NIOSH Alert also described best practices for handling, storage, disposal, and decontamination procedures and was updated in 2010 and 2012 to include an expanded list of hazardous drugs.(2,3) Also in 2010, NIOSH released a Workplace Solutions document to increase awareness of occupational safety and health issues in veterinary health care workers who work with antineoplastic and hazardous drugs.(4)
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