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  7. Explain how risk assessment can help address dilemmas...

Explain how risk assessment can help address dilemmas between rights and health and safety concerns

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This page is designed to answer the following questions:

NOTE: This page has been quality assured for 2023 as per our Quality Assurance policy.

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What is Risk Assessment?

Risk assessment is the process of identifying actual or potential hazards in the workplace, assessing the risks and taking action to minimise or eliminate the risk.

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Hazards are dangers that have the potential to cause harm.

Risk is based on the likelihood of a hazard causing harm and the severity of the impact it would have. They can be classified as low, medium or high risk. The image below gives an idea of how risk might be assessed.

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Hazards and risks can be related to the environment (setting), activities or situations. For example, an environmental risk assessment might include looking at things such as frayed carpets (trip hazard) or a build-up of clutter (fire hazard). Activity risk assessment might include wearing a helmet when going on a bike ride. A situational risk assessment could include the evacuation procedure if there is a fire.

Risk assessment guide to classification - low, medium or high.

Why is Risk Assessment Important?

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Risk assessment is an essential component of working in health and social care as it enables the individuals we work with to make informed choices and helps to minimise the impact of workplace dangers. This demonstrates good care provision and commitment to improvement and ensures that everybody stays safe. It is also the legal duty of both employers and employees to ensure the health, safety and well-being of themselves and others and risk assessment is a requirement of the Management of Health & Safety at Work Regulations 1999.

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Therefore risks must be monitored and dealt with efficiently. For example, if you observe a spillage in your workplace, you should either clean it up yourself or report it to the relevant person (usually your manager) so that they can arrange for it to be resolved. In the meantime, you should ensure the spillage is cordoned off to minimise risk to others. Ignoring hazards could result in harm to yourself or others and could leave you or your employer culpable for any harm that is caused.

How & When Should Potential Health & Safety Risks be Reported?

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Identified risks to health and safety should be reported immediately to ensure that everybody remains safe, however, the process for doing so will vary between organisations so it is essential to be aware of your own organisation’s reporting process. This may be done by using a computer system or a hand-written form or you may just be required to verbally inform your manager.

You should also be aware of the risk assessments that are in place for your workplace- this includes knowing where to find them, understanding them and putting them into practice. Your tutor may ask you to demonstrate that you are able to find and use risk assessments in your day-to-day practice.

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If you are in a senior or leadership role, it will be your responsibility to carefully monitor workplace risks as part of your general duties. This will involve planned and unplanned risks assessment. Planned would include a formal walk around your setting to identify any possible risks. Unplanned would be if you noticed a potential hazard whilst performing other tasks. In both cases, a risk assessment should be performed. The results should be recorded and action should be taken to minimise the risks. Risk assessments should also be reviewed regularly to ensure they are still relevant and ascertain if they have been successful or if other actions are necessary. When reporting the risk, it will also be useful for you to explain the actions you have already taken and whether they were successful.

For Level 3, it will be useful for your tutor to observe you identify a health and safety risk and go through the risk assessment process to eliminate or minimise the risk.

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Other Ways to Report Health & Safety Concerns (inc. Whistleblowing)

In some cases, it may be necessary to report health and safety concerns to other authorities. These include:

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  • Injuries, disease, death and dangerous occurrences must be reported to the Health & Safety Executive (HSE) as part of the RIDDOR regulations 2013
  • Food hygiene concerns should be reported to the environmental health department of the local authority
  • Failures in care provision should be reported to the Care Quality Commission (CQC)
  • Safeguarding concerns should be reported to the local authority’s social services department (however, you would probably report to your organisation’s safeguarding lead first)

Please check the websites of the organisations above to understand what should be reported and the reporting procedure.

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How to Perform a Risk Assessment

The risk assessment process involves identifying which activities have the potential to cause harm and then looking at ways of minimising that risk or removing the risk altogether. This does not mean that risks should not be taken, however, they should not be taken needlessly and processes and controls must be in place to reduce the risk of harm.

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The risk assessment process consists of five steps:

  1. Identify the hazards
  2. Identify who may be at risk
  3. Evaluate the risks and address them
  4. Record findings on a risk assessment
  5. Review the risk assessment periodically
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Example of a risk assessment

Many people initially struggle with the idea of risk assessments because they feel that they are complicated, however in reality they are really very simple and just require a bit of time and common sense. For example, I recently performed a risk assessment relating to an individual with a mild learning disability cooking in the kitchen. By supporting the individual to cook their dinner, I was able to observe the potential risks:

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  1. Identify the hazards – the individual has good basic cooking skills, however, they neglected to wash their hands before handling food and required prompts. They had good fine motor skills when chopping meat and vegetables but again would not have washed their hands between handling the raw meat and veg without prompts. When questioned, they did not understand the importance of handwashing. No issues with using the cooker.
  2. Identify who may be at risk – The individual may be at risk of food poisoning. Also, friends and family that the individual cooks for may be at risk.
  3. Evaluate the risks and address them – Risks can be mitigated by ensuring support staff are present to prompt the individual to wash their hands appropriately. The staff could also assist with the individual’s understanding of the importance of handwashing or the individual may wish to attend a local workshop on food hygiene.
  4. Record findings on a risk assessment – All this information was recorded on a risk assessment form.
  5. Review the risk assessment periodically – This risk assessment was set to be reviewed in two months to assess the individual’s progress in their food hygiene understanding.

Balancing Health & Safety with an Individual’s Rights

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When writing risk assessments relating to the individuals that you work with, it is important that you work in partnership with them to ensure a person-centred approach to your practice. Remember that unless there are mitigating circumstances, the individual will usually have the choice about whether they follow the advice you provide so keeping them involved enables them to make informed decisions. Sometimes, the simple act of sitting down with an individual and completing a risk assessment with them helps them to realise the potential dangers of an activity.

Risk assessments can be useful for addressing dilemmas between an individual’s rights and health and safety concerns.

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All individuals have the right to make their own decisions (even unwise ones) and take risks. As care workers, we should not tell an individual that they cannot do something or try to influence their decisions because of our personal beliefs and opinions.

However, we can help individuals to weigh up the pros and cons of their choices by assessing the potential risks and balancing them against the potential benefits. The risk assessment process can also help us to minimise or eliminate any risk associated with things that an individual wants to do.

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For example, an individual with very limited physical movement may want to go to the local swimming baths despite not being able to swim. By assessing the risks with their support worker, they identify that the primary risk of drowning can be easily mitigated by ensuring they use a flotation device (life jacket) and having support staff with them at all times. The risk assessment process has supported the individual to pursue an activity they want to do whilst ensuring health and safety risks are reduced to an acceptable level. This is an example of a positive, person-centred risk assessment.

Example question and answer

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James is 19 years old; he lives with his parents, twice a week he goes bowling or to the cinema with his support workers. They also go with him to the local college where he is studying Horticulture. At his last care planning meeting, James expressed a wish to live independently with someone of his own age. His mother is against any change; she has dedicated her life to caring for him since he was diagnosed as having Asperger’s Syndrome. She is particularly worried that James will be at risk because he has limited experience of living independently. She is concerned he will make himself ill because he has limited experience of general health and safety in the kitchen and has no understanding about food safety. She will not discuss it with James or the social care workers. James is very angry with her.   

Explain how a risk assessment might help address dilemmas between James’s rights and the health and safety concerns expressed by his mother.

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A risk assessment will identify any potential risks to James’ health and safety and put procedures and action plans in place to minimise them.

All individuals have the right to take risks and explaining this to James’ mother along with the purpose of the risk assessment may help her to understand that she is causing a barrier to his independence.

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Creating a risk assessment in partnership with an individual, their family, support staff and other professionals can help everybody to understand the risks involved in an activity and can highlight potential risks that may not have previously been considered. It would make James and his mother aware of the risks and allow them to develop strategies to reduce the risk as much as possible, whilst also allowing James to exercise his right to be independent. It will also help James to understand the responsibilities he will have for the safety of himself and others.

Having developed solutions to minimise potential risks, the risk assessment should be written up and reviewed on a regular basis to identify any changes that need to be made.

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