Bloodborne Pathogens

In todays article we will be discussing blood borne pathogens.  You have probably heard this term used before, but may be unaware of what it actually means.  So what is a blood borne pathogen?  Well, according to the site https://www.osha.gov/SLTC/bloodbornepathogens/ , a blood borne pathogen is a microorganism, that are infectious in human blood and can cause diseases.  Some of the blood borne pathogens you may have heard of before include HIV and Hepatitis B and C.  Obviously, if these pathogens can cause diseases, people need to be very careful when dealing with them.  OSHA actually has a blood borne pathogen standard for handling these pathogens.  According to the site https://www.osha.gov/SLTC/bloodbornepathogens/bloodborne_quickref.html , the OSHA blood borne pathogen standard can be found in 29CFR 1910.1030.  One area that this standard covers are the safeguards that are available to workers to keep them safe against blood borne pathogens.  There are many things that this standard covers.  Some of these areas include precautions, engineering controls, personal protective equipment, or PPE, the specific ways you are suppose to store and handle these pathogens in a lab setting, what you need to do if there is a possible exposure, as well as control plans for exposure so that it does not occur.  These areas are all equally as important because not only do they help yourself understand, but with that comes the responsibility of keeping everyone around you safe as well.  You might say to yourself, how are these pathogens spread?  Well, according to the site http://www.wpi.edu/offices/safety/bloodborne.html , blood borne pathogens are mainly spread through either sexual transmission or by an IV, however any contact with the infected blood, or body fluids, can lead to disease or infections so you want to be extra careful.  What can you do to protect yourself from these blood borne pathogens?  Well, also on this website are ways of protecting yourself from blood borne pathogens.  One very important way mentioned in this web site is the housekeeping of the pathogens.  This refers to how well you decontaminate objects and surfaces that come into contact with them, as well as the disposal of such objects.  Also, another way that you can protect yourself is by simply wearing the personal protective equipment provided to keep you safe from these infectious pathogens.  It seems so negligible to some people and they don't think wearing personal protective equipment matters, but it is one of the simplest and most effective things you can do in order to protect yourself not only from blood borne pathogens, but many hazards that can arise in the workplace.  Having the right mindset and understanding the risks involved when dealing with these pathogens is the first step in keeping yourself and others around you safe.  Wearing proper gloves and gowns as well as proper eye protection and masking is vital when working with or around these pathogens.  I hope this blog was helpful in providing some information to you about what a blood borne pathogen is and what you can do to protect yourself from being infected. 

Categorizing Hazards

As you may be aware, working in a lab can be very dangerous.  Hazards have the capability of popping up out of nowhere, and this makes the lab a very dangerous place to work.  So, knowing that there is a plethora of hazards that can arise while in the lab, you may think to yourself if there is a way to classify or categorize hazards.  Well, that is what we will be discussing in this blog today.  first of all, what even is a hazard?  Well, according o the site http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/hazard , a hazard is an unavoidable danger or risk, even though the hazard may be known and able to be pointed out.  Well, what is a risk defined as?  Not understanding the entire definition may give you a false understanding of what a hazard actually is.  According to the site http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/risk , a risk is the possibility of loss or injury.  So, now that we understand what a hazard can be defined as, how can these hazards be categorized?  Well, according to the site https://www.ccohs.ca/oshanswers/hsprograms/hazard_risk.html , there are six different types of hazards.  These six types include biological hazards, chemical hazards, ergonomic hazards, physical hazards, psychosocial hazards and safety hazards.  Each of these six types or categories of hazards deals with a different thing or things.  Biological hazards refer to those hazards dealing with plants and animals, viruses, bacteria and humans.  So, if you hear of a hazard dealing with Chemical hazards are those hazards that have to do with the properties of the chemical, whether that be the chemical properties of the chemical or the physical properties of the chemical.  An ergonomics hazard can be described when something has repetitive movements or if there is a work station set up incorrectly.  A physical hazard can be those involving different pressures, radiation levels, and possibly even noise.  Hazards in the psychosocial category can be described as those hazards dealing with violence or stress.  The last category is a safety hazard.  Safety hazards are those that can be described or defined as a tripping or slipping hazard, possible malfunctions in any equipment as well as machinery that has not been guarded appropriately.  As you can see from the descriptions listed above, there are many different types of hazards that involve many different areas.  Yes, it is possible to have more than one hazard present in a lab at a time.  For example, if there are a lot of loud machines running, that are not properly guarded, that would be a noise hazard potentially if the noise is loud enough after being measured, as well as a safety hazard because the machinery does not have the correct machine guarding that is required.  It may seem difficult to know what a hazard is.  That is why using these six categories, you will be able to classify the hazards better and easier than before because you will know what types of things make a hazard belong to a certain category.  I hope this blog was helpful in providing information about different types, as well as how to categorize hazards.

OSHA Lab Standard vs. other OSHA Standards

In case you are unaware of what OSHA is, OSHA stands for Occupational Safety and Health Administration.  It is a part of the Department of Labor, and according to the site https://www.osha.gov/about.html , OSHA aims to create safe working environments by setting standards to create such conditions.  With this in mind, OSHA is not one simple standard.  In order to keep people safe they need a lot of different codes and standards for anything that could happen in the workplace that could be detrimental to someone's health and safety.  In this blog, we will be discussing how the OSHA Lab Standard compares to the other standards covered by OSHA.  When looking at the lab standard, you'll see that it looks very similar to the other OSHA standards you may have looked at.  There are many sub sections in the lab standard, just like the other standards, that describe what needs to be done in order to keep an environment in  the lab safe depending on what the section is.  What is the most common accident in a lab you think?  Well, according to the site https://www.dartmouth.edu/~chemlab/info/safety/hazards.html , the most common accident in a lab is cutting yourself on glass and the equipment used during lab.  Many accidents come to mind, but most likely you think about hazardous chemicals and how they can be spilled, mixed, stored improperly, and be hazardous to someone's health.  Well, there is a section in the OSHA lab standard that deals specifically about hazardous chemicals in the lab.  In this section, there are a lot of things discussed, like if a liquid is a combustible liquid, what the flashpoint of the chemical is which, according to the Lab Standard, is the temperature at which a liquid gives off a vapor that can ignite in air.  Another thing found in this section is a description of personal protective equipment and how to use it.  Another very important thing mentioned in this part of the standard is where it mentions the reactivity of chemicals and what chemicals do when they are exposed to other chemicals are certain environments.  This section is particularly important because if chemicals are not labeled correctly then you may not be aware what chemical you actually are using, thus you may mix substances that can have a dangerous outcome.  Another section in the Standard describes how to use equipment in the lab and the machines you may be using in lab.  This is very important because using machinery that you are unaware of can be dangerous not only to you but to others around you.  So, compared to other standards of OSHA, the lab standard is basically the same thing.  There are different sections in it that describe how to learn about specific things that you need to know in lab like chemicals, protective equipment and machinery.  I hope this blog was helpful in providing information about what exactly the OSHA Lab Standard is and what its contents are compared to the other OSHA standards, and how they all have sections but the lab section is just lab based and contains information that pertains to lab safety.

OSHA Lab Standard Components

Obviously working in a lab can be very dangerous, that is why it is important to have standards set in laboratories so that the people working in them know what is safe and what is not safe.  OSHA has a standard for laboratory safety to make sure that people are being safe while working.  But what does the OSHA Standard include?  Well, according to the Standard, found in 29 CFR 1910.1450, the main components are Monitoring/PELs, Information and Trainings, Medical Consultation, Hazard Identification, Recordkeeping and Respiratory Protection.  What is a PEL?  A PEL is the permissible exposure limit.  So, the monitoring/PEL section in the standard is all about discussing how you monitor chemicals/fumes and how much exposure someone can have to a substance.  In the Information and Training section contains the Hazard Communication, or HazCom which describes hazards that can happen in the lab when dealing with certain substances.  It is important to look at the HazCom when dealing with a new substance, because if you haven't worked with it before you may be unaware of possible hazardous exposures.  This section also tells information about the signs of possible symptoms if an exposure ever occurs.  This is important when talking about different chemicals because different chemicals may lead to different symptoms. Also, how to use personal protective equipment is described in this section as well as how to recognize hazards in the lab.  Medical consultation occurs whenever there are signs of symptoms, as well as if the monitoring shows that the exposure limit has been exceeded.  This also happens if there is an accident in the lab, such as a spill.  No matter what the accident may be, there will be medical consultation afterwards because of the possibility of an exposure that could be hazardous to the employees health.   Getting medical treatment does not cost the employee anything.  Labels need to be easily read for hazard identification purposes.  This is a very important area of this standard.  If there are chemicals that are not properly labeled in the lab, someone working might think they are using a chemical that is not as toxic as what they are really using, or they might be mixing chemicals together and thinking they are using a different chemical, mix it with another and cause exposures that could be very dangerous to ones health.  Respiratory protection will not cost the employee anything. Recordkeeping is done for many things in the lab and has to be done for every employee.  This includes medical records and records concerning exposures as well.  These medical records are kept for 30 years after an employee works in a lab.  Why you may ask?  Well, if someone was working in a lab years ago and become sick years later after they worked there, the records to what they possibly could have been exposed to will be very helpful with the medical knowledge of the former employee.  Those are the main components of the OSHA Lab Standard.  I hope this blog was helpful in providing information about this topic. 

Ethics

What are ethics?  You may have heard this word used before but may not have fully understood what it meant.  Well, according to the site http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/ethics , ethics are "a system of moral principles".  Basically, ethics are the set of values that differentiate right from wrong when you think about the outcomes of an action.  So, now that we know what ethics are, when are they used?  Well, after class discussion about the article, "The Lawyer Who Became DuPont's Worst Nightmare" by The New York Times, we came up with six different areas of where ethics can be applied.  We decided that one area was ethics in government.  We actually discovered three areas within government that ethics can be applied.  These three areas are federal, state and corporate.  The next three areas where we discussed ethics are personal ethics, community ethics, and professional ethics.  In this blog, I will only be going into detail about one of these areas as it relates to the article we read.  The area of ethics that I will be discussing in this blog is the area of professional ethics.  In the article, the farmer was noticing that his cows were acting strange and were showing signs of being sick.  Some were even dying.  The farmer believed that the DuPont factory waste was the cause of the weird behavior and sickness of his cattle.  The local veterinarians of the town came to check the farmers cattle, however, said that the waste was not causing this sickness to his cattle and even though he had been taking care of cattle his whole life, they said that he was mistreating them and not taking good enough care of them.  Now, these veterinarians were paid off by DuPont.  The company brings in almost all the money that the towns receives.  To keep getting paid, the veterinarians made the choice to lie to the farmer about the health of his cattle in order to cover up the hazardous waste that DuPont was sending out.  The veterinarians also made this decision because if they went against DuPont for any reason, the entire town would ignore them and not speak to them.  The people of the town do that to anyone who goes against DuPont because they rely on it so much.  This act by the veterinarians has a lot to do with professional ethics.  From an ethics standpoint, you have to stop and wonder if the vets did the right thing here, by giving false information about animals when it is their job to take care of them.  They become vets to help and save animals, yet in this case to get more money, they are actually doing the opposite of what their job really is to help DuPont cover up their mess.  The farmer also lost friends he had known forever because they wanted nothing to do with the fight against DuPont.  Nobody would pump his gas, doctors refused to treat him, and he even had to change churches multiple times.  Those are also major examples of how professional ethics was involved in this case.  The doctors would not even discuss anything with him.  Isn't that what doctors are suppose to do?  Talk to people about their health?  This is a great example of how ethics can play a huge role in someone's profession.  In this case, the doctors are refusing to help someone who is seeking help that they need.  Ethics can make people do many things, and I hope this blog provided examples of how ethics can have a huge effect when dealing with someone's profession.  There is a certain standard of ethics when dealing in your profession and this article shows us that even within their professions, people make different decisions about ethics based on the circumstances.