Ontario: Does the screener asking questions & taking body temperatures need to be a health professional or can a workplace supervisor do this?

[vickyp]

#102756

Forum: Community

[vickyp]

#103190

Screener has gotta be a health professional or someone with appropriate training. Now this is all new stuff and nothing’s official, but the guidance makes that pretty clear. There may be an exception if you deploy one of those high tech systems that use infrared to read body temperature without making physical contact with the patient. But if you’re using the old fashioned thermometers, you need a health pro and not a manager without health training. We recently did a pretty good piece in OHSI that talks about the medical screening process and legal safeguards required. Check out. https://ohsinsider.com/tools/other/articles-workers-compensation-compliance-centres/social-distancing-the-10-things-to-include-in-your-covid-19-screening-policy Hope that helps. Glenn

[vickyp]

#103191

Hi, Julie. Just found some new guidance from WorkSafeNB that goes against what I was saying yesterday–at least in part. Bottom Line: Medical professional is first choice but management personnel is OK if med isn’t available as long as management person is properly trained. Remember, this is New Brunswick, not Ontario; but it’s still worth being aware of. Here’s the actual language–boldfaced the important parts.
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Employees must give informed and voluntary consent before an employer can take and record their temperature.
To help ensure that their temperature is taken accurately, consider asking a trained medical professional to take temperatures if one is available on site. The medical professional may also train others to take temperatures. The training should be documented. If there are no trained medical professionals on site, the employer should designate one or more management-level personnel to take temperatures. This individual should review the directions to use the thermometer or scanning equipment to ensure proper use. That individual should also be trained, and the training process should be documented. (boldface added by Glenn)
If the temperature is being recorded, employees may also be concerned about the privacy of this data. Only record the information that is necessary. The information collected when taking the temperature must be kept confidential and in a secure location. Access to the information should be limited to those who need the information to make decisions.

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