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April 5, 2024 16 mins

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Tired of snoozing through the same old lab safety spiel? Buckle up, because lab safety gurus Dan Scungio and Sean Kaufman are here to shake up the status quo of blood-borne pathogen instruction. Get ready to transform your approach to lab safety as they lay out the raw truth behind the cookie-cutter compliance culture that's numbing the minds of lab professionals everywhere. By bringing our personal frustrations to the table, we illuminate the stark difference between rote policy reading and the dynamic impact of hands-on mentorship. This episode promises to engage, enlighten, and challenge the way you think about lab training, emphasizing the need for behavior modeling over documentation.

Lab safety isn't just about ticking boxes—it's about embodying the very practices that keep us safe. Venture with us into the heart of what it means to standardize laboratory procedures, especially when infectious diseases are in play. Dan and Sean tackle the delicate balance between individual liberty and the absolute must of following safety protocols. We dissect the unique challenges diverse research labs face, the pivotal role of steadfast mentorship, and the uncompromising enforcement of standard operating procedures. Remember, it's not just about the written SOPs; it's the direct mentorship that embodies and upholds these life-saving practices that ultimately creates a culture of safety. Join us for a fresh take on fostering consistent, safe behavior in the laboratory.

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Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the Lab Safety Gurus Podcast.
I'm Dan Scungio.

Speaker 2 (00:07):
And I'm Sean Kaufman, and together we're providing
safety insights for thoseworking in laboratory settings,
doing safety together.
Alright, dan, how many timeshave you taken the OSHA
blood-borne pathogen training?
Oh, sean.

Speaker 1 (00:30):
Let's see how many years have I been a medical
laboratory scientist, working ina hospital setting, forced to
take the OSHA-mandated classevery year, the computer-based
training?
It's over 30 years, probablyover 30 times then.

Speaker 2 (00:45):
Are you excited when you get that notification that
says Dan it's time for safetytraining.

Speaker 1 (00:53):
You know it's that time of year already.
They've downloaded the newcomputer based trainings for the
year.
They're not new, they're thesame ones as last year.

Speaker 2 (01:03):
Excitement is not a term I would use, not even close
that the worst thing that canhappen is you literally give
people training that does notmake them.

(01:26):
It's just not exciting to them,it's beyond repetitive.
At this point it's almost likean overkill.
But the saddest part is that Ifind that when you give people
training and it doesn't offerthem much, their excitement and
openness to trainings that couldmake a profound difference are

(01:49):
certainly lowered and weakenedas a result of that type of
response.
I don't know.
Do you have any thoughts aboutthat?

Speaker 1 (01:57):
Yeah, and that's just talking about like the
mandatory training.
But when you my experience inthe laboratory setting for
training, it's not any better,for even some of the hands-on.
Nowadays most of the policiesand procedures are electronic
and when you first get into thelaboratory, your first few days

(02:19):
first maybe week even you sitdown and you have to do your
computer-based training and thenyou have to go read policies
and procedures and that's howyou start training.
Now if you're an experiencedlaboratorian, you probably think
, okay, this is the drill.
I know it's the drill.
I'll find out what this job'sabout in a couple weeks when I
really start bench training.

(02:40):
But if you're new to the careeror it's your first job, that is
the worst, worst thing you cando to somebody.

Speaker 2 (02:47):
Well, everything you've just said yeah,
everything you've said justbroke my heart.
I'm sitting here thinking as ahuman being, the worst thing you
can ever do and we talked aboutthis in a previous podcast the
worst thing you could ever do ishave people read things during
the first couple weeks of work.

Speaker 1 (03:06):
If they're going to do that let them stay home, let
them read it from home.
Right?
When I talk to my managers whodo that with their training, I
kind of get the same answer Well, if I don't make them read all
the policies and procedures now,they'll never do it.
And I just got to get this partout of the way.
And I don't have time to workwith them this week, or I don't
have enough staff to train themthis week, so it's just easier

(03:29):
to sit them at a desk.

Speaker 2 (03:33):
Yeah, it's just so sad because you're literally
defeating the greatest gift ahuman being has, which is
replication of behavior, bysimply watching.
You don't teach people how tobehave in a lab with policies.
You teach people how to behavein a lab by modeling the
behavior you're looking for.
And the same goes withleadership.
You don't teach leaders how tolead with a book.

(03:54):
You teach leaders how to leadby being an example of a leader.
And that's the most frustratingpart.
Dan, let me ask you this youropinion why do we even train?
Now, be honest here.
I mean seriously be honest here.
Why do most people train yeah,why?

Speaker 1 (04:13):
Because when you come into a new setting, you don't
know how to do anything withouttraining.

Speaker 2 (04:19):
No, I love that, I love that, but come on,
seriously think about it.
Why does your organizationtrain?

Speaker 1 (04:28):
Well, okay, if you're talking about my organization,
we train laboratorians becauseit's required.

Speaker 2 (04:35):
Nope, so it's a CYA issue.

Speaker 1 (04:38):
It is, it's a check the box.
Our accrediting organizations,that's right, our accrediting
organizations.
Not only do they say we musthave training, but they say we
must have a training procedure.

Speaker 2 (04:53):
Now why.
This is the interesting part.
This is the neat part.
You ready, this is the coolpart.
Let's dive deep into this.
Okay, why do you think peoplehave to tell people to train?

Speaker 1 (05:06):
Why do you think people have to tell people to
train?
Because there have beenworkplaces who have just
probably thrown their staff newstaff onto the work area without
any sort of training and therehave been problems.

Speaker 2 (05:23):
Okay, so what you're saying is this is what I liken
it to.
If I had a child and I said tothe child would you like to play
video games or go to school?
What do you think the childwould say?

Speaker 1 (05:34):
Video games, all the way.

Speaker 2 (05:36):
And if you say to a scientist would you like to do
science or would you like to dotraining, what do you think the
scientist is going to sayScience, yes.
So obviously we're going tohave to tell people they have to
train.
Okay, I get that.
I get that, but this is.
Let's dive deeper now, dan,tell me what you think the
difference is between awareness,training and education.

Speaker 1 (06:00):
Hmm, so awareness is that something exists, a danger
exists, a function or a processexists.
Education is something youshould come with already before
you.
If I'm going to work in alaboratory, I should have some

(06:21):
sort of laboratory education sothat I have the background to
know what they're talking aboutwhen they start talking about
these things that are going onin this workplace, and then
training should be specific tothat workplace.
I might have learned what aTrinder's reaction is for
glucose in chemistry class, butthis is the analyzer I'm going

(06:43):
to learn to use so that I canrun a glucose with that
Tringer's reaction.
This is something I've neverseen before.
I like it Is that it?
Yeah, it's close.

Speaker 2 (06:52):
I like it.
I think we're on the same page.
So for this podcast, let'sdefine awareness, as I'm going
to teach you about the risks andthe benefits of what I'm going
to ask you to do.
The training is actually thebehavior I'm going to actually
get you to do it and theeducation is your experience

(07:15):
plus your training, meaning younow are transitioning to an
expert.
You're not looking for how toperform when everything is
perfect in the lab.
That's what you would do whenyou train.
You're actually a problemsolver, a critical thinker.
You have the experience and thetraining to put it together and
be more of an expert in thelaboratory environment.

(07:38):
And it's really neat becauseEinstein has several quotes
attributed to this.
An education without training oran education without real life
experience is a waste of bothtime and money.
Rather, you get life experiencefirst and then get educated so
you can streamline it.
And that analogy works when welook at, say, for example,
swimming.
If I try to increase yourawareness about swimming before

(08:02):
I actually give you put you in apool to swim, it's a waste of
time.
Hence, reading protocols beforeyou actually have somebody do
the behavior waste of time.
It may make them feelcomfortable, but it's not going
to necessarily generate any morebehavior than if you didn't
give them that.
But the reality is that whensomebody gets comfortable with
the water, it's then that I cancoach them on how to master

(08:25):
swimming.
If I try to coach them on howto master swimming before they
even learn how to swim, it'sagain a waste of time and
resources.

Speaker 1 (08:31):
Yeah, that's not going to work.

Speaker 2 (08:33):
But let's get back to this now.
If we define awareness,training and education, we
separate the three.
Okay, and we separate the three, then the goal of training is
to ensure that what we expect ofa staff member, the staff
member is actually capable ofdoing.
So, meaning, the goal oftraining is to teach them the
actual behaviors, right?

Speaker 1 (08:54):
Yeah, makes sense.

Speaker 2 (08:55):
And standard operating procedures are really
not SOPs.
They're standard operatingbehaviors and unfortunately the
acronym SOB has already beentaken.
So I can't, I can't, I can'thave to wait on that one.
But if we're trying to teachthem to to practice standardized
behaviors, that means thatwe're going to have to train

(09:15):
them.
So, dan, in your experience,what has been some training
strategies that you'veimplemented to get consistency
of behavior among your staff?

Speaker 1 (09:31):
For me, when I do training, it's about repetition,
a lot of repetition.
So if I'm training somebodywho's new to the blood bank, for
example and I haven't done thisin a few years since I've been
in safety, but I've managed it acouple of times for sure I
don't want somebody just toperform one blood type and

(09:53):
antibody screen before you knowthey're set loose on the world
taking care of patients.
I want to teach them, show themhow it's done, and then I want
them doing it, whatever that is,if it's the automated version
or the manual version andrepeating that until there's a
sense of security for both me asthe trainer and them as the

(10:17):
learner.

Speaker 2 (10:18):
No, so I love that.
I'll tell you a true story here.
You know I had traveled theworld and watched how people
behaved under the guidance ofstandard operating procedures
and I was really very frustratedthat we weren't seeing
consistency of behaviors.
I mean, we'd have all theseunbelievable SOPs and no
consistent behavioral practices.

(10:40):
That's how valuable readingSOPs are.
It doesn't work when you'redealing with a human being.

Speaker 1 (10:44):
It may program a computer't work when you're
dealing with a human being.

Speaker 2 (10:46):
It may program a computer, but it doesn't work
with a human being.
And then I flew down toHonduras.
I'll never forget it.
It's the only time I've everseen something like this, dan,
where I get into a lab and I'mobserving and there's about you
know six or seven people in thislab and they are doing Dan.
They're doing everythingexactly the same way.
I'm watching their procedures,I'm watching their donning and

(11:06):
doffing of PPE, how they'recleaning biosafety cabinets, how
they're working in the lab.
It's like identical to oneanother.
And I ask them to show me theirSOPs.
Because I was at that point.
I you know, I was following thenarrative that everything is
based on an SOP and the reality,dan, blew me away.
They had no SOPs.

(11:28):
Dan, are you listening to me?
No, they had no SOPs.
None, none.
I said how do you get your staffto behave consistently in the
lab?
And the supervisor said well,we bring them in when they're
new and we say this is what wewant you to do and we do it for
them want us to do it, and theytell and they guide.

(11:53):
So the person still is doing it, but the person's guiding them
now and acting like a robot, andthen they put that person in
the chair and they say now showme, you can do it.
And they do it.
And then they say if you want ajob, you'll do it exactly that
way, otherwise you will not havea job anymore.
And that is how they traintheir staff.
And then they go throughadvanced training at a later
date when they would dosomething.

(12:14):
Something's wrong.
So they have an incident in thelab, or they have a spill or
whatever, and what happens isthey use that moment to train
people on how to respond to aspill or something unexpected.
Hence education.
So you have to be trainedbefore you you get educated.
But that is that is the placethat I saw some of the most
amazing results was in thatlaboratory, and it was not

(12:35):
within the SOPs, it was withinhow individuals were trained.

Speaker 1 (12:41):
Do you feel like there was a measure of like how
much did culture play into this?
Because sort of I don't want tocall it fear, but basically
they're told if you want to keepyour job here, you will do it
this way.

Speaker 2 (12:57):
Well, I mean, dan, we've talked about this.
This is where thataccountability comes in.
I'm not paying you to do whatyou want to do and I'm not
paying you to do things your way.
When you get paid to do work,you're being paid to do things
the way the organization isasking you to do it, and I'm
sorry, we really do have aculture and a society that's

(13:21):
having a challenge here, wherethey're saying you know well, we
can't really.
You know we have to give peopletheir personal autonomy.
Listen, you can do that maybesomewhere else, but when we deal
with infectious diseases andwhen we've made promises to the
animals that feed us, the plantsthat feed us and the human
beings that live outside of labsand the human beings that work

(13:43):
inside labs, we can't afford tosay do it your own way and do
what you think is best.
We have to do it in a verystrategic and calculated way and
we have to standardize thoseprocesses, and that's important.
We can't allow people personalautonomy when working with
infectious diseases.

Speaker 1 (14:02):
Yeah, that's especially true in the
laboratory.
I think it should be true inevery type of laboratory.
I know that, like in researchlaboratories, when you have
different PIs over the samelaboratory and different
students and grad studentsworking in there, there's no

(14:22):
good oversight, so that sort ofrepetition of behavior doesn't
really happen.
And then things happen like somany people are working in this
department that we better youknow we can't find the chemicals
we need, so let's store them inalphabetical order.
Ouch, you never do.
That would not support what youdescribed as the vision in that

(15:00):
lab in Honduras, because theylet people get away with I'll
say a lot more.
These days it seems like andbehaviors are not consistent and
some people you know they'regoing to try to get away with
what they can get away with, andit's unfortunate, especially if
it involves safety.

Speaker 2 (15:16):
Absolutely so.
I mean again, just to wrap itup and I love our discussions, I
think we've got to have moreand more of these.
Sometimes I wonder, dan, and Ireally do.
I think the standard operatingprocedures are things that are
written for organizations,written for leaders, written for
regulators, but are they reallywritten for staff?
And there's no doubt that it'sa strategic approach for staff

(15:41):
to follow, but a staff memberdoesn't need an SOP.
What a staff member needs isthey need somebody to mentor the
most appropriate behavior thatthe lab has decided to do that
happens to be the SOPappropriate behavior that the
lab has decided to do thathappens to be the SOP.
They need somebody not only tomentor them on that behavior but
also hold them accountable fordoing that behavior.
And it all starts with training.

(16:02):
We are the lab safety gurus,dan Scungio and Sean Kaufman.

Speaker 1 (16:08):
Thank you for letting us do lab safety together.
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