Individuals are not perfect and infrequently make mistakes. We take shortcuts, overlook find out how to do things, or become distracted at occasions after we shouldn’t. In most points of our lives, these are not things that have dire consequences. At work, however, surrounded by hazards, these types of errors can alter lives, even finish them. So, despite the fact that human beings will not be good, we have to make our safety programs as near excellent as we can.
PPE Focus: Face Shields
Personal protective equipment (PPE) is a side of safety the place individuals tend to make many mistakes, and for a wide range of reasons. Usually, we think that the mere wearing of PPE makes us proof against injury. With as much emphasis as we place on eye protection and head protection, can we lose sight (no pun supposed) of protecting our faces? Actually, eye protection is vital, since eye injuries can lead to everlasting blindness. Equally essential is head protection, preventing fatal head accidents the very best that we can. Face accidents might not seem as significant a priority. They do not have the instant, permanent, and potentially deadly penalties of the others. With that said, though, an employer’s accountability is to protect all elements of their employees, including their faces.
That duty includes identifying tasks where face shields ought to be used, providing face shields for workers to make use of, training them to make use of face shields accurately, and to appropriate staff when face shields are used incorrectly or not used at all. The first elements are easy. Our staff will make mistakes. Correcting those errors and implementing your company’s face shield necessities is an essential a part of an efficient PPE program. Sadly, too typically, this aspect of the PPE program just isn’t enforced until after an worker is injured.
Situations to Use Face Shields
Consider the next situations the place face shields ought to have been used, and the results for the injured workers and their employers.
An worker was filling ammonia nurse tanks from a bulk plant. The worker was distracted while closing the valves, and mistakenly turned the unsuitable valve, inflicting a pressure release within the line. The discharge of anhydrous ammonia splashed on the worker’s face. The employee was hospitalized for chemical burns on and around the face.
An worker was installing a water pipe at a multifamily residential construction project. The employee initially was operating an excavator, then climbed down from the excavator to cut a ten-inch water pipe with a lower-off saw. The noticed kicked back and struck the employee’s face. Co-workers called emergency services, who transported the employee to the hospital. The worker was admitted to the hospital and handled for facial lacerations that extended from underneath the left eye to underneath the jaw.
In the first scenario, the employee suffered serious chemical burns. A face shield would have significantly reduced the chemical publicity, the extent of the chemical burns, and possibly might have prevented any ammonia from splashing on the worker’s face. Yes, the worker turned the mistaken valve, but does that mean that the employer is absolved of all responsibility for this incident? After all not. The very fact remains that the employer ought to provide workers filling ammonia nurse tanks with face shields, train employees to use the face shields correctly, and require them to make use of them when performing this task. Then they need to regularly and persistently enforce the face shield requirements. Doing so would have provided additional protection to the worker, even from the effects of the employee’s own actions.
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