The following summarizes key provisions of the Hexavalent Chromium (CrVI) standards potentially affecting the selection and use of respiratory protection for CrVI exposures in the workplace. Where applicable, guidelines assisting employers to comply with OSHA requirements are offered. This summary was prepared by the 3M Occupational Health and Environmental Safety Division and does not represent an official, legal, or complete interpretation of the regulation.
THERE is no better way to ruin a perfectly good day than to make a mistake in the use of your air monitoring instrumentation. Industrial hygienists; military, industrial and public-sector hazmat teams; fire departments; and safety personnel from all sectors routinely make decisions regarding life safety based, in no small part, on data obtained from air monitoring instrumentation.
"WE'VE got twenty-five years of audiometric data that shows what we're doing in our Hearing Conservation Program doesn't really work." I couldn't believe my ears. The safety manager at this large company administered a totally compliant OSHA-standard Hearing Conservation Program. Everything had been in place for more than two decades: noise monitoring, audiometric testing, hearing protectors, annual training, and recordkeeping.
WHEN you consider the many regulations and guidelines that health and safety officers and first responders are faced with, it is amazing they maintain the ability to detect such a wide variety of hazardous pollutants and toxic agents. There is no lack of regulations governing how to monitor chemical compounds, and the list grows longer all the time.
WE live and work in the 21st century--the age of information and the Internet. The prevalence of data and the desire to obtain more information, and get it faster, consume our personal as well as our professional lives.
THE welding industry is rated number one among all industries for the highest number of eye injuries. Based on a Prevent Blindness America report (www.preventblindness.org), eye injuries accounted for approximately 15 percent of total injuries and accounted for more than three times the number reported in the construction industry.
ACCORDING to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, about 2,000 workers have a job-related eye injury that requires medical treatment each day. One-third of these injuries are treated in hospital emergency departments, and more than 100 result in one or more lost work days.
"HERE, look through these--look at the glare on that glass building," he said, handing me a stylish pair of top-of-the-line polarized safety sunglasses. "Now, look through these.
WELDING is dangerous enough when it takes place in an enclosed welding shop with the combination of heat, burning metal, and the optical rays given off by the process. On an open manufacturing floor or maintenance shop, the welding risks to those who are nearby and unprotected include:
EACH day, about 2,000 U.S. workers suffer a job-related eye injury requiring medical treatment, according to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH). In addition, roughly one-third of these injuries require treatment in hospital emergency rooms, with 100 injuries resulting in one or more days of lost work.
IF you feel that there have been more "once in a lifetime" natural disasters in the past few years to last 10 lifetimes, you're not imagining things. The International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, which publishes a World Disasters Report annually, calculates that from 1994 to 1998, reported disasters averaged 428 per year.
SINCE Sept. 11, 2001, there has been an ever-increasing demand for civilian escape masks that are capable of protecting untrained users from chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) inhalants. The anthrax attacks around the country also furthered this demand. To respond to this concern and demand for personal protection, a number of companies began to market escape mask products to the general public and other untrained user populations.
WE sometimes hear the expression, "His life is hanging by a thread." This becomes true literally for those who fall while protected by a "fall arrest system." By definition, this "system" consists of an anchorage connector, a body harness, a lanyard, deceleration device, lifeline, or a suitable combination of these.
ONE of the biggest barriers to effective use of hearing protection devices (HPDs) as the last line of defense against noise in the workplace is that there has never been a good way to test performance. How can we trust PPE if we don't know how well it works? Laboratory rating systems do a good job of measuring the protective capability of HPDs to block noise, but study after study has shown that real people working in real noise conditions rarely achieve the levels of protection that would be expected based on the laboratory testing reflected in the noise reduction rating (NRR) label on the HPD package.
EACH year, more than 100,000 injuries and deaths are attributable to work-related falls. According to the National Safety Council, falls are one of the leading causes of deaths in the workplace. In addition to permanent injuries and lost lives caused by falls, businesses lose billions of dollars each year from significant increases in insurance premiums, worker's compensation claims, product liability costs, and other related expenses.
SHORTcircuits and faults in electric power systems are nothing new--and are typically damaging and even deadly. One type of fault that has received particular attention in recent years is the arc fault, or fault current that travels through the air, which differs from the bolted fault current that flows through conductors, busbars, or other equipment optimally designed to withstand its effects.
RESPIRATORS are essential personal protective equipment for protection against some airborne biological hazards in health care settings, tuberculosis (TB), the virus causing severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), avian influenza, and smallpox virus among them.
YOUR hearing protection/conservation program is rolling along. Upper management is in full support. The budget is workable and approved, including audiometric testing, and engineering corrections (where possible) have been put into place. Your written program is great.
OSHA's PPE standards and its handy eTool are the first stops to make when the question concerns eye and face protection. 29 CFR 1910.132 (general requirements), 1910.133 (general industry), 1915.153 (maritime), and 1926.102 (construction) say employers must ensure each affected employee uses appropriate eye or face protection when exposed to eye or face hazards from flying particles, molten metal, liquid chemicals, acids, caustic liquids, chemical gases or vapors, and potentially injurious light radiation.
FALL protection equipment and training in the construction industry have come a long way in the past 50 years. Today, by law, any worker exposed to an unprotected fall of 6 feet or more must wear--and companies must provide--appropriate fall protection equipment.