Blood Borne Pathogens in the Lab

For this blog we examined a lab used for blood borne pathogens. This lab is most commonly BSL 2. It is not under the OSHA standard since it is in a college but there are rules under the OU policy. There are around 13 students in the lab every year and they have to undergo blood borne pathogens training. This lab is under the exercise physiology department. All chemicals here are registered under the government, if they are not registered then they will have to face fines. Also, if they have excess of a certain chemical they have to report it. The lab has to be reapproved every couple years by the university. There are meetings about which chemicals are being stored every quarter when an Environmental Health Science officer inspects the lab. This lab does not have a chemical storage cabinet due to lack of funds, however they are still being stored properly. The chemicals being stored in the fridge are not being stored properly since they are using a normal fridge which is not intrinsically safe. It is not explosion proof and it could have an electrical spark. There was also issues with their disposal of two-part pathogens; they should be disposed every two weeks, however they are disposed here every couple months due to lack of funds. These are sometimes allowed to be dumped down the drain if the concentration is low enough; for this process you must add bleach to it and then dilute with water as you pour it down the drain. The man showing us around told us that he does not enforce personal protective equipment but he tells them too wear it when they first get there. At the end of each lab they always unplug everything. There are many things that go wrong in the lab, some common things are: forgetting to put the lid on the centrifuge which causes the vials to break and the contents to aerosolize. When this happens they must leave the lab for at least ten minutes. Some students also sometimes forget to pour the chemical and bleach mixture with water down the drain, this creates poison gas which requires them to run the water and leave the lab for ten minutes. The lab tables are covered with an adsorbent material that they change very frequently. This lab did not have a drain in the floor so if they ever have to use the eye wash station the water will have nowhere to go and remain stagnant on the ground. The eye wash and shower station are an extension of the sink. There is proper ventilation in this lab where the chemicals can get sucked out of the room. Overall I thought that this lab was in good shape however it did not seem like the professor in charge was enforcing the student’s safety enough which could cause health problems for both the university and the students careers out of college. This could develop into a major problem and needs to be addressed right away.

https://www.osha.gov/

https://www.ohio.edu/policy/numeric.html