What is an incident?
An incident is an unplanned event (including dangerous occurrences and systems failures) resulting in, or having a potential for injury, ill health, damage, or other loss.
During student placements, we strive to prevent incidents from occurring. However, students might encounter situations such as:
- Cat/dog scratches or bites
- Injuries from large animals (getting stepped on)
- Trips and falls
- Back strain from lifting
- Sharps injury from needles or scalpel blades.
All incidents and near-misses (hazards) must be reported to the University. High-consequence incidents require immediate reporting by the student. Other incidents should be reported within 24 hours of becoming aware of the incident, injury, or illness.
Reporting an incident
If you are a student
Incidents and hazards must be reported through the University's risk reporting and recording tool, the Enterprise Risk Management System (ERMS).
If an incident occurs, students should follow the below process:
- Ensure your own safety first.
- Provide care for any injured individuals, call emergency services at 000 if necessary, and seek assistance from placement staff.
- Inform your supervising clinician and the academic lead overseeing your rotation or EMS.
- Log the incident in the University’s ERMS incident reporting system. Both the academic lead and the student can log incidents in ERMS.
- In case of incidents at Greencross Veterinary Hospital, contact Todd Wade. Ensure the incident is also logged in PawsUp, the Greencross Workplace Safety Management System, and inform your University academic supervisor.
If you are a host organisation
Please note that host organisations cannot access the ERMS system and must inform the Melbourne Veterinary School of any incident by emailing an incident report (please use the email address previously used in communication with your practice).