Analyse critique de la culture de sécurité face aux risques biologiques et pandémiques pour les infirmières

At an international, national or provincial level, there is a growing concern related to biological risks and infectious disease.  Emerging diseases such as SARS or influenza A/H1N1 brought a pandemic risk management and the development of emergency measures to control these risks: developing a safety culture has become a research priority for the WHO.  However, few writings exist about the desire to secure health and well-being through a variety of devices in which the discourses takes a predominant place as regards of security against biological risks.  From the perspective of prevention and infection control (PCI), in which the nurses specialize, a socio-political reflexion was necessary since they are at the forefront in providing care to the population.  Therefore, the purpose of this project was to explore the discourses surrounding the safety culture against biological risks in the context of a Quebec healthcare facility “Centre de santé et de services sociaux” (CSSS). Biological hazards are perceived as identifiable, measurable and avoidable if the nurses apply the preventive and infection control measures, which is part of a positivist perspective of risk (Lupton, 1999). Managing these risks is declined through a purification and protection rituals in order to protect themselves from any infectious disease. Faced with these risks, a unique safety culture is emerging in the CSSS following a disease prevention perspective. However, the desired safety culture is faced with a mosaic of cultures that cover different ways to apply or not the prevention and infection control (PIC) measures according to participants. The contribution of this research is important within the prevention and control of infection field for Quebecois nurses. Critical analysis of power relations has raised questions about nursing surveillance, valorized confession policy, punishment for any deviation from the normative application of the PCI standards, monitoring by the nursing managers and subjugation of bodies within disciplinary mechanisms. It made it possible to document the presence of safety devices in conjunction with maintaining statistics on patients who are listed as infectious cases, but also in terms of flux of person’s movements within the institution. The presence of a pastoral power is perceptible in the translation of the administrative role of nurse who must ensure that its teams act in the right way and apply the preferred CSSS PIC standards to regulate the rate of nosocomial infections present within the establishment. In case of non-compliance with PIC related measures to hand hygiene or vaccination, the nurse may be subject to disciplinary action from the warning, the relocation, the exclusion or suspension of the employment. A culture of blame has been described by the search for a culprit in the institution.  Within the CSSS, the Other is perceived as being the source of contamination, while the Self is seen as free from any risk from the moment the nurse respects the standards of hygiene of life in terms of healthy dietary habits and physical activity. In addition, nurses must respect the PIC standards they know little, since the research participants noted the lack of academic and continuous training concerning infectious diseases, biological hazards and safety culture that they consider prioritized by their health institution.  Power produces effects on the bodies by modifying them. This ethnographic study criticizes, made it possible to raise the sociopolitic stakes connected to the involved speeches and to clarify what Foucault called the government of the bodies and his effects which are capillaries in the nurse’s daily normalities. Further researches are necessary to explore this nursing speciality and to link academic and continuous training to clinical infectious realities.

Keyphrases: Nursing, Foucault, Safety culture, Infectious disease, Biological risks, Nursing, Critical ethnography, Foucault, Government of the bodies