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108 Personal Protective Equipment: Basic
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108 Personal Protective Equipment: Basic

PPE Training

You are told to mix a certain chemical with water to use as a cleaning agent to clean your company trucks. You check out the chemical. It looks like water, doesn't feel any different than water, so you assume PPE isn't necessary. You start washing the trucks and get your hands and arms wet with the mixture. You don't feel any pain or stinging, so you assume it's as safe as water. But this assumption is very wrong.

You've been using a mixture of hydrofluoric acid and water. By the time you get home your arms are in severe pain. You rush to the hospital, but by the time you arrive, it's too late. The hydrofluoric acid has penetrated your skin on both of your arms, clear through to the bone. Fluorine ions have replaced calcium ions in the bone, effectively turning it into a sponge-like consistency. You're fortunate in a way; the doctors have to amputate only one arm. They manage to save the other one.

Photo of a group of workers participating in hands-on training to put on and take off necessary PPE.
PPE training must be "hands-on-how-to."

This scenario would not have occurred had you been properly trained in using PPE. The PPE standard mandates the employer must provide "hands-on-how-to" (practice) training to each employee who is required to use Personal Protective Equipment. To meet the minimum training requirements, each employee receiving PPE training must be trained to know at least the following:

  1. when PPE is necessary;
  2. what PPE is necessary;
  3. how to properly don, doff, adjust, and wear PPE;
  4. the limitations of the PPE; and
  5. the proper care, maintenance, useful life, and disposal of the PPE.

So far, we meet the minimum OSHA requirements. However, there's a crucial piece missing. The PPE standard does not specifically require educating employees on the reasons why PPE is necessary.

So, why is this element so important? Because study after study tells us the most common reason employees don't follow rules in the workplace is because they don't know why the rules are important.

Knowledge Check Choose the best answer for the question.

1-5. Which PPE training topic is missing from OSHA criteria, but should be a part of every training presentation?

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