FOR decades, studies in the workplace have shown hearing protectors to be underperformers: Real-world attenuation (noise blocking) is less than the published Noise Reduction Rating (NRR) for many workers. Studies like these have spawned a variety of de-rating schemes for hearing protectors that are often misunderstood or misapplied, such as the 50 percent OSHA de-rating or the NIOSH 75/50/30 percent de-rating for ear muffs, formable ear plugs, and pre-molded ear plugs, respectively.
DURING the past half century, technology has improved virtually every aspect of human life. However, during this period, not much has changed in the world of personal protective equipment. For hearing safety, workers may choose either ear plugs that are inserted into the ear or ear muffs that cover the ears.
WHEN Hurricane Katrina slammed ashore in 2005, it helped drive home the fact that intense hurricanes are becoming a constant concern for residents along the Gulf Coast and Florida coastal regions. While no hurricane touched the U.S. coastline in 2006, that unusual respite is not likely to be repeated this year, according to a forecast issued by Colorado State University's forecasting team. The El Nino weather conditions that led to a quiet Atlantic hurricane season in 2006 will probably dissipate by summer, leading to above-average hurricane activity for 2007.
PICTURE, if you will, the new Safety Director at a sheet metal fabricator in the early 1990s. Fresh out of college with a degree in Safety Engineering and a desire to work in industry, he sincerely wants to "help" promote the idea of a safe workplace. He wants to "make a difference."
On the first day of his new job, he is confronted with an accident that results in a severe laceration of a worker's hand. A hospital trip is involved. This one will definitely go down as a Lost Time Accident. There is grumbling about a potential lawsuit.
ON-THE-JOB injuries cost employers nearly $1 billion per week in payments to injured employees and their medical care providers, according to Boston-based Liberty Mutual, the leading private provider of worker's compensation insurance in the United States. Where do the injuries come from? Falls are one of the leading causes of deaths in the workplace, according to the National Safety Council.
MORE than 30 million workers are exposed to hazardous noise levels in the workplace. It is estimated that costs just for work-related hearing disability exceed $242 million annually! The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health reports hearing loss is one of its priority areas for research for this century. Noise-induced hearing loss is the most common way for a person to lose hearing; one out of every 10 Americans suffers a loss of hearing severe enough for it to affect daily conversation and how normal speech is understood.
"I need ear plugs--what've you got handy? Can I have these?" This request startled me, coming as it did from a senior-citizen-age office worker whose regular work environment was one of the most tomblike in the building. So I began to quiz her on what she needed and how she planned to use the hearing protection, thinking maybe a music concert with grandchildren, some target practice, or leaf blower/lawn work was causing her concern. Unfortunately, this was not the case.
At the start of the American Industrial Revolution, worker safety and health were nowhere near the priority they are today. As manufacturing grew, so too did worker injuries and deaths. The idea of safe work grew slowly from a small glimmer to a bright flame inside the collective consciousness of the American workforce.
What's the good news for safety in 2007? Just look around.
Devastating catastrophes and the work of key individuals have contributed to the evolution of modern occupational health and safety.
ONE of the most significant challenges today faced by law enforcement and professional cleaning companies is methamphetamine laboratory seizure and cleanup. These makeshift and chemically "dirty" facilities pose real health risks for those required to enter and clean these areas.
HAVE you ever cringed to see someone wearing a filtering facepiece for protection from exposure to organic vapors? The worker probably thought one respirator was as good as another. Misunderstandings in respirator selection can lead to overexposures and illness.
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.