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Any employee who may use or have work at Analytical Laboratory in any specialty: Engineering, food testing, Biochemistry, Biology and Biotechnology, Physics, Chemistry and its branches,... etc.
The "Methods manual for forest soil and plant analysis" (Kalra and Maynard,1991) gives a useful list of various points to improve safety in a laboratory. With some modifications, this list is reproduced here (with permission). It is suggested that each laboratory adapts and moulds this list into a SOP called "Good Laboratory Behaviour" or "General Laboratory Rules".
1. All employees must receive and understand the locally applicable Workplace Hazardous Materials information guide or equivalent (if such a guide exists). In any case, the management is responsible for proper instruction.
2. Develop a positive attitude toward laboratory safety: prevention is better than cure.
3. Observe normal laboratory safety practices.
4. Good housekeeping is extremely important. Maintain a safe, clean work environment.
5. You may work hard, but never in haste.
6. Follow the safety precautions provided by the manufacturer when operating instruments.
7. Monitor instruments while they are operating.
8. Avoid working alone. If you must work alone, have someone contact you periodically.
9. Learn what to do in case of emergencies (e.g., fire, chemical spill, see4.2.6).
10. Learn emergency first aid (see4.2.5.2).
11. Seek medical attention immediately if affected by chemicals and use first aid until medical aid is available.
12. Report all accidents and near-misses to the management.
13. Access to emergency exits, eye-wash fountains and safety showers must not be blocked. Fountains and showers should be checked periodically for proper operation. (Safety showers are used for chemical spills and fire victims.)
14. Wash hands immediately after contact with potentially hazardous or toxic chemicals.
15. Clean up any spillage immediately. Use appropriate materials for each spillage.
16. Dispose of chipped or broken glassware in specially marked containers.
17. Use forceps, tongs, or heat-resistant gloves to remove containers from hot plates, ovens or muffle furnaces.
18. Do not eat, drink or smoke in the laboratory. In many countries smoking in common rooms is prohibited by law.
19. Do not use laboratory glassware for eating or drinking.
20. Do not store food in the laboratory.
21. Telephone calls to a laboratory should be regarded as improper disturbance and therefore be restricted to urgent cases.
22. Unauthorized persons should be kept out of a laboratory. Visitors should always be accompanied by authorized personnel.
23. All electrical, plumbing, and instrument maintenance work should be done by qualified personnel.
24. Routinely check for radiation leaks from microwave ovens using an electromagnetic monitor.
25. When working with X-ray equipment, routinely check (once a week) for radiation leaks from X-ray tubes with appropriate X-radiation detectors. In some countries wearing a film badge is obligatory. However, this is no protection!
26. Use fume hoods when handling concentrated acids, bases, and other hazardous chemicals. Fume hoods should be checked routinely for operating efficiency. Do not use them for storage (except the cupboards underneath, which preferably have a tube connection with the fume cupboard above for ventilation).
27. Muffle furnaces must be vented to the atmosphere (e.g. via a fume cupboard).
28. Atomic absorption spectrophotometers must be vented to the atmosphere (if necessary via fume cupboard). Ensure that the drain trap is filled with water prior to igniting the burner.
29. Use personal safety equipment as described below.
a. Body protection: laboratory coat and chemical-resistant apron.
b. Hand protection: gloves, particularly when handling concentrated acids, bases, and other hazardous chemicals.
c. Dust mask: when crushing or milling/grinding samples, etc.
d. Eye protection: safety glasses with side shields. Persons wearing contact lenses should always wear safety glasses in experiments involving corrosive chemicals.
e. Full-face shields: wear face shields over safety glasses in experiments involving corrosive chemicals.
f. Foot protection: proper footwear should be used. Do not wear sandals in the laboratory.
30. Avoid unnecessary noise in the laboratory. Noise producing apparatus such as centrifuges, or continuously running vacuum pumps should be placed outside the working area.
31. Cylinders of compressed gases should be secured at all times.
32. Never open a centrifuge cover until the machine has stopped completely.
33. Acids, hydroxides, and other hazardous liquid reagents should be kept in plastic or plastic coated bottles.
34. Do not pipet by mouth.
35. When diluting, always add acid to water, not water to acid.
36. For chemicals cited for waste disposal, write down contents on the label.
37. Always label bottles, vessels, wash bottles, etc., containing reagents, solutions, samples, etc., including those containing water and also those you use for a short while (this while may become days!).
38. Extreme care is required when using perchloric acid, otherwise fires or explosions may occur. Work must be performed in special fume cupboards, certified as perchloric acid safe, with a duct washdown system and no exposed organic coating, sealing compound, or lubricant. Safety glasses, face shield, and gloves must be used. When wet-digesting soil or plant samples, treat the sample first with nitric acid to destroy easily oxidizable matter.Oxidizable substances (e.g. tissue, filter paper) should never be allowed to come into contact with hot perchloric acid without pre-oxidation with nitric acid. Do not wipe spillage with flammable material. Do not store on wooden shelves. Do not let perchloric acid come into contact with rubber.
39. Read labels before opening a chemical container. Use workplace labels for all prepared reagents indicating kind of reagent and concentration, date of preparation, date of expiry and the name of the person who prepared it. Good Laboratory Practice prescribes that all these particulars, including the amounts of components used, are recorded in the Reagents and Solutions Book .
Useful information can also be found on Internet e.g., http://www.safety.ubc.ca/manual/safema12.htm.
Every employee of a laboratory should have knowledge of emergency first aid and roughly one out of every ten employees of a whole institute should have a valid First Aid certificate including an endorsement for resuscitation. These qualifications should be mentioned on the Staff Record Form model PERS012 . The management should encourage first aid training and the essential refresher courses by allowing time off and a periodical bonus.
Since no paragraph nor even a chapter can take the place of a proper first aid training, only some major practical aspects will be mentioned here to provide the basics of emergency first aid. These may be summarized in a SOP or Instruction.
Essential Items and Equipment
1. Names and internal phone numbers of employees with First Aid certificate.2. Telephone numbers of physicians and hospitals as well as the general emergency number.3. First Aid kit4. Eye wash fountains or bottles.5. Safety showers (at least one per laboratory).
It is the (delegatable) responsibility of the head of laboratory that these items are in order. A check-list for regular inspection of these points should be made (and kept, for instance, with the First Aid kit).
Items1 and2 could be taken care of by issuing a sticker with this information to each employee (to be stuck onto or next to his/her telephone).
The First Aid kit should be the responsibility of one person who keeps a logbook of regular contents checks and purchased supplements. Tallying used materials from the First Aid kit in practice appears to be illusive. Also eye-wash equipment and safety showers need to be inspected regularly. When an eye-wash bottle has been used, it should be replaced or refilled and the expiration date revised.
Emergency First Aid
Sometimes, in case of an accident, there is no time or possibility to await qualified help. In that case, the necessary help needs to be given by others. The most important general points to observe are listed here:
1. Stay calm, try to oversee the situation and watch out for danger.
2. Try to find out what is wrong with the casualty.
3. Take care that the casualty keeps breathing. If breathing stops, try to apply artificial respiration by mouth-to-mouth or mouth-to-nose insufflation. When unconscious, turn casualty on his/her side with the face tilted to the floor (support head by kind of cushion).
4. Staunch serious bleeding. If necessary, arterial bleeding may be stopped by pressing a thumb in the wound.
5. Do not move the casualty unless he/she is in a dangerous position (e.g., in case of gas, smoke, fire or electricity), then carefully move casualty to a safe place.
6. Put the casualty's mind at rest.
7. Call qualified help as soon as possible: medical service, a physician and/or an ambulance, and if necessary, the police. Do not leave casualty unattended.
A few specific accidents that may occur in the laboratory are the following:
Burns:
Hold affected parts of the skin for at least10 minutes in cold water. Try to keep the bum sterile and do not apply ointment.
Corrosive burns:
(e.g. by hydrogen peroxide): wash the affected part of the skin thoroughly with water.
Eye (corrosive) burns:
Wash eye thoroughly with tap water: use an eye fountain or eye-wash bottle or a tubing connected to a tap.
Hydrofluoric acid burn:
Wash the affected part with dilute ammonia (1-2%) or sodium bicarbonate solution.
Poisoning by swallowing:
1. Corrosive solutions (acids, bases):
Let the casualty drink one or two glasses of water to dilute the poison. Vomiting should not be induced.
2. Petroleum products.
Do not induce vomiting (the products may get into the bronchial tubes).
3. Non-corrosive solutions (e.g. herbicides, fungicides):
Try to induce vomiting. Swallow activated charcoal.
In all these cases must the casualty immediately be taken to a physician or hospital. Try to bring the original container (with or without some of the poison).
As in the case of First Aid, a number of employees should be properly trained in fire fighting, this goes especially for laboratory personnel. Therefore, at this point only general instructions will be given to be applied when no qualified person can help in time. These instructions can be moulded into a Standard Instruction to be issued to each and every employee.
Necessary items and equipment
1. Fire-proof blanket.
2. Safety shower (at least one per laboratory).
3. Buckets with sand.
4. Portable fire extinguishers of essentially two types: CO2 or b.c.f. (halon, halogenated hydrocarbons) since these can be used without causing damage to electrical equipment. The extinguishing power of halon is about6 times that of CO2! Water has the disadvantage that it conducts electricity, powder extinguishers (containing salts) cause damage to instruments.
Actions
When fire is detected stay calm, try to oversee the situation and watch out for danger. Then the following actions should be taken in this order:
1. Close windows and doors.2. Give fire alarm (shouting, telephone, fire alarm).3. Rescue people (and animals if present).4. Switch off electricity and/or gas supply.5. Fight fire, if possible with at least two persons.
Persons with burning clothing should be wrapped in a blanket on the floor, sprayed with water or be pulled under a safety shower. A CO2 fire extinguisher can also be used, but do not spray in the face.
When using fire extinguishers it is important that the fire is fought at the seat of the fire i.e., at the bottom of the flames, not in the middle of the flames.
If gas cylinders are present there is the danger of explosion by overheating. If they cannot be removed, take cover and try to cool them with a fire-hose. When the situation looks hopeless, evacuate the building. Let everybody assemble outside and check if no one is missing. To practice this, a regular fire drill (once a year), should be held.
The management should have a calamity scenario drawn up for the whole institute as a Standard Instruction which is issued to each and every employee.
Since you mentioned equipment, here are some of my suggestions:
The main safety or very important that should equipped with any laboratory institutions are the installation of electrical and waste drainage connections according to the international standard.
safety equipments needed before starting any analytical work includes:
1. Personal Protective Equipment
2. eye wash and safety shower.
3. Fire Emergency station
4. Biological Spill Kit
5. Chemical Spill kit
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Simply it depends on the department & job role of the employee.
so in biochemistry department, the employee can work with simply if he wears the facemask, Labcoat, gloves, glass& head cap
but in biotechnology especially in DNA & RNA testing, the employee should work in clean Hepa-filtred biosafety Cabinet in addition to the previous items.
so the major part is to check the safety procedure for each department & sometimes for each test to control the environmental work to give best results & be safe.
Regards
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