Medical and First Aid

First aid supplies and other medical services must be available at your jobsite. The minimum OSHA requirements are:

·             Medical personnel must be available for advice on occupational health matters.

·             Prior to the start of a project, provisions must be made for prompt medical attention in case of serious injury.

·             An infirmary, clinic, hospital, or physician must be nearby, or someone trained in first aid must be available at the worksite.

·             First aid supplies must be easy to get to.

·             Having available means to transport an injured person to a physician or hospital.

·             If 911 service is not available, the posting of emergency numbers for physicians, hospitals, and ambulances.

On-site medical treatment—The construction rules for medical services and first aid say that prior to starting a project, provisions must be made for prompt medical attention in case of serious injury. This means that when an injury or illness occurs, maximum response time is fifteen minutes. This is currently recognized by OSHA as appropriate for most cases.

However, conditions at each workplace must be looked at when the first aid program is developed. This is to ensure that fifteen minutes is adequate to meet all needs. Where a medical facility is near the workplace, OSHA rules require your employer to ensure the following:

·             In areas where accidents resulting in suffocation, severe bleeding or other life threatening injury or illness can be expected, a three to four minute response time is required.

·             In other circumstances, for instance where a life-threatening injury is an unlikely outcome of an accident, a longer response time of up to fifteen minutes is acceptable.

·             If you work in areas where emergency transportation is not available, your company must provide acceptable transportation. If arrangements cannot be made to provide emergency medical service within an appropriate time frame, then a trained first aid person must be available for each shift.

Eyewash/drenching stations—Where you may be exposed to injurious corrosive materials, suitable eyewash/drenching stations must be available at your jobsite.

You need to review your company’s Emergency Action Plan for first aid and medical services. It should outline everything you need to know to get help during a medical emergency.

This information is provided by: Assurance Agency

Spill Cleanup - Tool Box Safety Talks

Because of the seriousness of the safety and health hazards related to hazardous waste operations, spill cleanup and emergency response requires that you have a thorough understanding of:
• How to recognize and prevent hazards.
• Select, care for, and use respirators properly, as well as other types of PPE.
• Use proper decontamination procedures.
• Understand the emergency response plan, medical surveillance requirements, confined space entry procedures, spill containment program, and any appropriate work practices.

Required training
If you are responsible for spill cleanup and emergency response, you must be:
• Adequately trained for the intended duties.
• Properly equipped for the intended task.
• Capable of responding to the release in a safe manner.
• Managed by competent leaders.
• Understand the emergency response plan, medical surveillance requirements, confined space entry procedures, spill containment program, and any appropriate work practices.

What must I do?
You must know the names or titles of those employees who are responsible for site safety and health.

This information is provided by: Assurance Agency

Walking- Working Surfaces

Overview
Slips, trips, and falls account for many industry accidents. Slips, trips, and falls are responsible for 10 percent of all accidental deaths. They are also the fourth leading cause, following motor vehicles, homicides, and being struck by objects or equipment, as a cause of fatalities.

In an attempt to remove potential hazards from the workplace, OSHA developed 1910, Subpart D—Walking—Working Surfaces. Subpart D.

Hazards involved with using walking-working surfaces
The main hazard involved with walking and working surfaces include slips, trips, and falls. Stairways are also taken for granted, and so become a source for accidents in the workplace.

What must my employer do?
Your employer is responsible for providing a safe working environment. That includes reducing or eliminating hazards in walking and working areas by:
- Keeping all employment, passageway, storerooms, and service rooms clean, orderly, and sanitary.
- Maintain floors in a clean and, so far as possible, dry condition. If wet processes are used, drainage shall be maintained. Gratings, mats, or raised platforms must be provided.
- Floors, working places, and passageways are to be kept free from protruding nails, splinters, or loose boards.
- Keeping aisles and passageways clear and in good repair with no obstruction across or in aisles that could create hazards.
- Appropriately marking permanent aisles and passageways.
- Maintaining proper aisle width so as to not limit passage or egress.
- Providing covers and/or guardrails to protect open pits, vats, tanks, ditches, and other hazards.
- Following load rating limits for all floors or roofs.
- Maintain adequate lighting in areas to illuminate walking surfaces.
- Providing handrails as required.

This information is provided by: Assurance Agency

Respiratory Protection

OSHA’s Respiratory Protection Standard was effective April 8, 1998.
It is estimated that the this rule will prevent more than 4,000 injuries and illnesses annually. With the new rule, in addition to saving lives and preventing injuries and illnesses, employers will realize up to $94 million a year in savings on injury and illness-related costs. The new standard reflects current respirator technology and better ways to ensure they fit.

The revised standard requires:
- A written plan with worksite-specific procedures to tailor your employers program to each worksite.
- A hazard evaluation to characterize respiratory hazards and conditions of work to assist employers in selecting appropriate respirators.
- A medical evaluation to determine ability of workers to wear the respirator selected.
- Fit testing of tight-fitting respirators to reduce faceseal leakage and ensure that the respirators provide adequate protection.
- A training program to ensure that your employees use respirators safely.
- A periodic program evaluation to ensure that respirator use continues to be effective.

Why use respirators?
Respirators protect you against hazardous atmospheres containing:
- Particulates/dusts (silica).
- Vapors and gases (carbon monoxide).
- Immediately Dangerous to Life or Health (IDLH) atmospheres (oxygen deficiency).
- Physical agents (radioactive particles).
- Biological agents (mold spores).

When are respirators required?
Exposure to any material or substance at a concentration above the permissible exposure limit (PEL) specified in Appendix A to 1926.55 must be avoided. Compliance must be achieved by using administrative (i.e., employee shift changes) or engineering (i.e., ventilation) controls first. When these controls are not feasible to achieve full compliance, protective equipment must be used to keep the exposure within the PELs prescribed.
Whenever respirators are used, their use must comply with 1926.103—Respiratory protection. Various airborne contaminants in Appendix A of 1926.55 do not list PELs but instead send you to another portion of the construction regulations. These contaminants are called OSHA specific contaminants. Examples are: Asbestos (1926.1101), alpha-Naphthylamine (1926.1104), and lead (1926.62). There are approximately 27 of these substances. These OSHA specific contaminants have their own PELs and specific requirements. When you are required to use respirators, then all requirements of 29 CFR 1910.134 apply.

This information is provided by: Assurance Agency