Federal Daily - September 22, 2009

FAA Consolidates Aviation Safety Services

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on Sept. 17 announced it was consolidating its accident and prevention services efforts into one office to improve aviation safety. The new Accident Investigation and Prevention Service combines the work of the Offices of Accident Investigation and Safety Analytical Services, FAA said in a statement posted on the agency Web site. The new organization will consolidate resources so FAA can better understand risks through the use of data from accident and incident investigations, and historical accidents and incidents. The new office also will analyze voluntarily submitted information from industry Aviation Safety Action and Flight Operational Quality Assurance programs, FAA said. The office will be headed by Jay Pardee, who most recently was the director of the FAA Office of Safety Analytical Services. To see more, go to: www.faa.gov/news/press_releases/news_story.cfm?newsId=10804.

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VA Facilities Pass Follow-up Equipment Inspection

In a sharp turnaround, all of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) medical facilities visited by inspectors passed surprise inspections of their cleaning and reprocessing procedure for VA’s colonoscopic equipment, according to a VA Inspector General (IG) report. The positive report, released Sept. 17, was in contrast to a report released earlier this year showing that half of VA facilities failed inspections. Of the 129 facilities inspected in August, all were compliant with VA standards on employee training, and all proper procedures were followed in cleaning and reprocessing the equipment, the IG said. The IG conducted the inspections after VA earlier this year announced it had sent notifications to 10,555 veterans warning them they may have been exposed to diseases after undergoing endoscopies with improperly reprocessed equipment at three VA sites in Tennessee, Georgia and South Florida. In some cases, equipment was reprocessed at the end of the day, rather than between patients, as required by the manufacturers. Although fifty-six patients potentially screened positive for infections, it is uncertain whether the endoscopes are the source, VA said. To see more, go to: http://www1.va.gov/opa/pressrel/pressrelease.cfm?id=1772.

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