Health & Safety Policies and Procedures

1. Principles

Safety is a core value at American Medical Academy and the Institution is committed to the continued advancement of an institutional safety culture with strong programs of personal safety, accident and injury prevention, wellness promotion, and compliance with applicable environmental and health and safety laws and regulations.

American Medical Academy Institution makes all reasonable efforts to:

• Promote occupational and personal safety, health, and wellness.
• Protect the health and safety of American Medical Academy Institution faculty, staff, and students.
• Provide information to faculty, staff, and students about health and safety hazards.
• Identify and correct health and safety hazards and encourage faculty, staff, and students to report​ potential hazards.
• Conduct activities in a manner protective of the environment and inform the American Medical Academy community regarding environmental impacts associated with institutional operations, and Maintain a risk-based emergency management program to reduce the impact of emergency events to the American Medical Academy.

2. Responsibilities

Adherence to good health and safety practices and compliance with applicable health and safety regulations is the responsibility of all faculty, staff, and students. Line responsibility for good health and safety practice begins with the supervisor in the workplace, laboratory, or classroom and proceeds upward through the levels of management.

In academic areas, supervisors include faculty/principal investigators, laboratory directors, class instructors, or others having direct supervisory and/or oversight authority. Academic levels of management are the department chairperson or Independent Lab director, dean, the Dean of Research, and the President. Administrative levels of management include managers, directors, and vice presidents.

1. Supervisory Responsibilities

Institution supervisors, including faculty supervisors and Principal Investigators (PIs), are responsible for protecting the health and safety of employees, students and visitors working under their direction or supervision. This responsibility entails:

• Being current with and implementing American Medical Academy Institution health and safety policies, practices and programs.
• Ensuring that workplaces, including laboratories, and equipment are safe and well maintained.
• Ensuring that workplaces or laboratories are in compliance with American Medical Academy policies, programs and practices, and
• Ensuring that employees, students and visitors under their supervision or within their work areas have been provided with appropriate safety training and information and adhere to established safety practices and requirements.

1. Managerial Responsibilities

Institution managers, academic and administrative, are responsible for ensuring that:

• Individuals under their management have the authority to implement appropriate health and safety policies, practices and programs.
• Areas under their management have adequate resources for health and safety programs, practices, and equipment; and
• Areas under their management are in compliance with American Medical Academy Institution health and safety policies, practices and programs.

1. Faculty, Staff, and Student Responsibilities

Faculty, staff and students are responsible for:

• Keeping themselves informed of conditions affecting their health and safety.
• Participating in safety training programs as required by American Medical Academy policy and their supervisors and instructors;
• Adhering to health and safety practices in their workplace, classroom, laboratory and student intern/externships; Advising of or reporting to supervisors, instructors or potentially unsafe practices or serious hazards in the workplace, intern/externships, classroom or laboratory.

1. Safety Performance

Each individual at American Medical Academy is expected to perform all work safely. Managers and supervisors shall establish and maintain a system of positive reinforcement and escalated discipline to support good health and safety practices. Safety performance shall be a part of every individual’s role and responsibility as well as performance expectation and evaluation.

3. Providing a Safe Workplace

American Medical Academy’s program for providing a safe workplace for faculty, staff, and students includes facility design; hazard identification, workplace inspection and corrective action; shutdown of dangerous activities; medical surveillance: and emergency preparedness.

1. Facility Design

Facilities will be designed in a manner consistent with health and safety regulations and standards of good design. Those Institution departments charged with primary responsibility for the design, construction, and/or renovation of facilities, together with EH&S shall ensure that there is appropriate health and safety review of facility concepts, designs, and plans.

1. Hazard Identification and Correction

American Medical Academy Institution encourages employees and students to report health and safety hazards to their supervisors and managers. Employees and students shall not be discriminated against in any manner for bona fide reporting of health and safety hazards to American Medical Academy or to appropriate governmental agencies. Supervisors shall inform students and employees of this policy and encourage reporting of workplace hazards.

Supervisors, both faculty and staff, shall assure that regular, periodic inspections of workplaces are conducted to identify and evaluate workplace hazards and unsafe work practices.

• The frequency of inspections should be proportional to the magnitude of risk posed in the particular workplace.
• Means of correcting discovered hazards and/or protecting individuals from the hazards shall be determined and implemented appropriately.
• Unsafe conditions which cannot be corrected by the supervisor or manager must be reported to the next higher level of management. Any individual, supervisor or manager who becomes aware of a serious concealed danger to the health or safety of individuals shall report this danger promptly to the Administration.

1. Emergency Response and Preparedness

EPP coordinates overall emergency response planning for the institution and provides guidelines for departmental emergency response plans. Every department shall have an individual emergency response plan and shall develop business continuity and contingency plans and implement appropriate mitigation programs to reduce the impact of emergency events.

Schools and departments shall maintain local departmental emergency operations centers and communications capabilities according to guidelines in the campus emergency plan. Multiple departments located within individual buildings will jointly develop comprehensive building-based life safety response plans.

Emergency plans shall include evacuation and assembly procedures, posted evacuation maps, reporting and communication practices, training, and drills.

4. Safety Communication and Training

Safety and compliance required training shall be communicated in a manner readily understandable to faculty, staff and students, in accordance with the communication policy outlined below.

1. Systems of Communication

Managers and supervisors, both faculty and staff, shall establish, implement and maintain a system for communicating with employees and students about health and safety matters. Information should be presented in a manner readily understood by the affected employees and students. Due attention must be paid to levels of literacy and language barriers. Verbal communications should be supplemented with written materials or postings if appropriate. Whenever appropriate, statutes and policies affecting employees and students shall be available in the workplaces.

1. Communication About Hazards

Faculty, staff, and students who may come in contact with hazardous substances or practices either in the workplace or in laboratories externships shall be provided information concerning the particular hazards which may be posed, and the methods by which they may deal with such hazards in a safe and healthful manner.

1. Training

Supervisors, including faculty, shall be experienced, trained or knowledgeable in the safety and health hazards to which employees and students under their immediate direction and control may be exposed, and shall be knowledgeable of current practices and safety requirements in their field.

Faculty, staff and students shall have or be provided the knowledge to protect themselves from hazards in their working and learning environment. Supervisors, both faculty and staff, shall ensure that employees and students have received appropriate training and information regarding:

• General health and safety practices of the workplace or laboratory, including emergency procedures;
• Job-specific health and safety practices and hazards;
• Recognition and assessment of health and safety risks; and,
• How to minimize risks through sound safety practices and use of protective equipment; and,
• Awareness of appropriate practices to protect the environment.

Training shall occur when:

• An employee is hired or student is new to the laboratory;
• An employee or student is given a new assignment for which training has not previously been received; and
• New hazards are introduced by new substances, processes or equipment.

Faculty, staff and students should, periodically, be retrained or demonstrate an understanding of current standard safety practices and requirements for their areas.