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animal hospital or veterinary clinic, and at all times. “If you think you might ever become pregnant, take precautions! You never know what fate will give you, and you need to protect yourself now, when you’re young and healthy,” he said. “After you find out you’re pregnant is not the time to close the barn door.” The bottom line, in Seibert’s eyes, is to
follow the rules. “Wear gloves to handle chemicals, an apron when doing X-rays. This is not a time for over-reliance on equipment you aren’t used to using, which can lead to a sense of false security.” General good hygiene and common sense for practice activity are also impor- tant, which is where the hospital owner or manager can have a voice by establishing staff-wide guidelines that call for washing hands after handling chemicals and ani- mals, along with “solid safety principles.” Seibert advised pregnant workers in animal hospitals to check with their doc- tors about ergonomics, activity limits and any related concerns. Echoing Riley’s per- spective from the medical provider’s side of the desk, he suggested, “Take your job description to your obstetrician and ask if you can do the tasks that you’re respon- sible for. Your physician has to know how strenuous your job is. You have to initiate the conversation with the doctor.” For the practice owner or manager, it is important to understand that a preg- nant employee should be treated the same way as everyone else in the prac- tice. “The focus should be on the ability to perform, not on someone’s physical status,” Seibert explained. Employees, on the other hand, have to
understand that “being pregnant is not a get-out-of-work-free card.” He suggested that the employer open the necessary conversation about what the employee will be able to do. “The biggest thing you can do is say, ‘Talk to me,’” he noted. In Seibert’s experience, most pregnant
workers want to keep their jobs, but not cause any risk to their babies. “That’s exactly what the employer should con- sider,” he said. He suggested that hospital owners or managers encourage pregnant
Trends magazine, September 2011
employees to give their job descriptions to their doctors. As for the employee, “absolutely talk
to your physician,” he said. “Do your research, but have a healthy dose of skepticism about [anything that is not] conventional wisdom. Don’t believe everything you see on the Internet.” Both an animal hospital owner and a
pregnant employee should consider that accommodations might have to be made at some point. “You might have to reas- sign someone to lighter duties, or replace her,” he said. “Look at your employee manual—you might have to give someone leave without pay.” These are some of the aspects of workplace policy that should be spelled out in advance, he noted. The employee, Seibert said, has
responsibilities as well. “Be honest with yourself and your colleagues,” he urged. Not only might there have to be accom- modations in what duties a pregnant employee can safely handle, “you might not go back to work immediately after you give birth. The business has to plan around your absence. Your job has to be held for you, but you have to let the busi- ness know what you intend to do so it can make plans accordingly.”
The employer’s responsibility The owner of an animal hospital has the same responsibility to pregnant (or possibly pregnant) employees as to any- one else in the practice: to provide a safe and healthful work environment. That means the employer must provide pro- tective aprons and gloves, guidelines, and training. “You don’t have to provide a respirator for when an employee is in surgery,” according to Seibert, “but the employer does have to follow OSHA stan- dards or you can be fined.” The best protection for the practice as a whole is to be educated about OSHA requirements, Seibert said. “Know [and follow] the guidelines ahead of time— don’t wait until an employee says she’s pregnant” to institute the appropriate protective measures, training, equipment and related aspects of workplace safety.
When an employee is pregnant might be a good time to review those guidelines and how the hospital carries them out, but the safe behaviors and equipment should already be a matter of course throughout the hospital. Training on proper, safe use of any and all equipment is essential, as is regular, appropriate maintenance of that equipment.
Possible cause for concern
While common sense and OSHA guidelines provide most of what a preg- nant worker or animal hospital staff might need to know, research continues in this important area of employee health and safety. Adeleh Shirangi, MPH, PhD, a senior lecturer in the Department of Epi- demiology at the University of Western Australia in Perth, Western Australia, has published several studies in this arena to date, some of which present findings that can create concerns. Shirangi has found that, for instance,
“Long working hours and performing surgery in the absence of a scavenger system for anesthetic gases are important risk factors for preterm birth in female veterinarians.”1 “Veterinarians have occupational
exposure to several known reproduc- tive hazards, such as radiation, anes- thetic gases, pesticides and long working hours,” Shirangi and her co-authors said in the journal article. They also noted that “considerable
variability of exposure still exists within the profession. We also have investi- gated maternal occupational exposures and risk of spontaneous abortion in veterinary practice.” They found small- animal practices to be sites of greater risk than those caring for large animals, although the risk of physical injury from animal patients may increase in large- animal practices. In other research, Shirangi and her co-
authors reported that “a study in female veterinary staff and some studies in other occupations have not revealed any association between exposure to ioniz- ing radiation and malformations” (birth
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