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Police Drawing Blood In DUI Probes Can Injure, Infect &
Kill Citizens.
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The Arizona Republic
Police Drawing Blood In DUI Probes Can
Make That Drink Your Last
By Matthew H. Green
The Arizona Republic
Nov. 21, 2004
You may not think so, but if you drink wine with dinner, or
have a beer after work, it's quite possible that at some time in the future
you'll be stopped and investigated for DUI.
In the past, this meant that you would have been expected to
submit to a breath test, or a blood test administered by a nurse or
phlebotomist, usually at a local hospital or clinic.
But things have changed. Local law enforcement agencies now send
their DUI patrol officers to the one-week Phoenix College Law Enforcement
Phlebotomy course. Although authorizing police officers to draw
blood may sound good in theory, the reality on the streets may make you change
your mind.
Police officers in Arizona commonly draw blood in the backs of patrol cars, on
the side of the road, on the hoods and trunks of cars, in holding cells and
other rooms within the jails, and in mobile DUI vans.
The director of the Phoenix Police Department DUI Van program
has testified that bodily fluids such as blood, urine, saliva and sweat have
all been excreted by people in the van, yet no formal protocol for
disinfection and sanitation of the area before drawing blood exists.
Similarly, the coordinators of the Phoenix Police Department
and Maricopa County Sheriff's Office phlebotomy programs have admitted, under
oath, that they do not require their officers to disinfect the areas where
these invasive medical procedures are performed.
Cathee Tankersley, the director of the Phoenix College program,
would probably agree that it's a good idea to draw blood in a sterile
environment. According to her textbook, health care facilities are
required by OSHA to disinfect the areas where blood is drawn once every eight
hours.
Why? Because
it's important that patients not be put at risk of contracting bacterial and
other infections, like HIV and Hepatitis B and C.
Tankersley would also probably agree that it's important to stabilize a
person's arm when drawing blood. During the Phoenix College course (and in
Tankersley's textbook), the officers are instructed to use a formal phlebotomy
chair with a proper armrest when drawing blood.
But police officers in Maricopa and Pima counties regularly draw blood on the
side of the road with nothing to support the person's arm, in many cases while
the person is standing. If a patient's arm is not properly secured when
sticking a needle into it, the likelihood of damaging a vein, artery, nerve or
tendon increases.
The odds of such an injury occurring are further increased
when a police officer, who typically performs fewer than 50 blood draws a
year, is performing the procedure.
Private-sector phlebotomists, in contrast, complete hundreds of
blood draws a year - sometimes more than a thousand. And they administer the
procedure in safe medical environments.
Civilian phlebotomists also have the benefit of working
alongside other health care professionals.
Most police officers, in contrast, are not directly supervised
when drawing blood. In fact, most officers who draw blood are never
required to have their phlebotomy skills re-evaluated once they complete the
one-week crash course at Phoenix College.
Paramedics, EMTs and nurses, by comparison, are required to
demonstrate their continuing proficiency to be recertified each year.
While preventing people from driving drunk is extremely important,
it is also critical that the government not place the average citizen in
excessive physical danger when investigating a crime.
In the past, our police departments arranged for civilian
health care professionals to draw people's blood in recognized medical
facilities. It's a practice that works for the rest of the country, and it
worked in Arizona for decades.
Must some of our citizens be needlessly injured or infected before
we realize that police officers should not be in the business of drawing
blood?
* Written by
Matthew H. Green for The Arizona Republic, 11-21-04.
** Matthew H. Green is a Phoenix attorney who
formerly worked as an assistant public defender in Maricopa and Pima counties.
*** Link to the original article at;
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