Employee Wears Respiratory Mask, but a Respiratory Mask is not required

apestate

Quite Involved in Discussions
#21
If someone knows off hand, what would the situation be if an employee requested one of these cartridge type respirators, but the OSHA guidelines did not require the employer to provide them?

For instance, our company does plenty of welding. We have direct ventilation/filtering at the welding booths and room filtering above, and the air quality is quite good. I don't know if it has been measured.

However, if you're flux-core welding or using alot of oil based anti-spatter spray, the smoke can be quite noticable. If a welder requests a respirator for his own health, and we are not OSHA required to provide it, does he have to purchase it for himself?

Thank you Jim Wynne and Discordian for your particularly helpful posts. I also vote that this is an excellent discussion.
 
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ScottK

Not out of the crisis
Staff member
Super Moderator
#22
atetsade said:
If someone knows off hand, what would the situation be if an employee requested one of these cartridge type respirators, but the OSHA guidelines did not require the employer to provide them?

For instance, our company does plenty of welding. We have direct ventilation/filtering at the welding booths and room filtering above, and the air quality is quite good. I don't know if it has been measured.

However, if you're flux-core welding or using alot of oil based anti-spatter spray, the smoke can be quite noticable. If a welder requests a respirator for his own health, and we are not OSHA required to provide it, does he have to purchase it for himself?

Thank you Jim Wynne and Discordian for your particularly helpful posts. I also vote that this is an excellent discussion.

Engineering controls (i.e. ventillation) are ALWAYS preferable to PPE.
But you have to prove that it is sufficient.
If you don't have the air quality numbers to back up your claim you may have to cave to the demand of a respirator, at leat until you can prove that the air contaminents are below OSHA PELs.

As an alternative - there are non-cartridge respirators out there specifically for welding nuisance fumes.
http://www.airgas.com/browse/product.aspx?Msg=RecID&recIds=318371&WT.svl=318371
you still may need a respiratory protection program but you can eliminate the maintenance factor with these.

If your air sampling comes back OK, then you could follow the same voluntary rules as the OP.

If welding is a major part of your operations I would highly recommend air sampling in the welding areas with personal dosimeters. Most liability insurance providers I've worked with (like Fireman's Fund) have Industrial Hygienists on staff to help with this sort of thing. I have taken advantage of that in the past.
 

ScottK

Not out of the crisis
Staff member
Super Moderator
#23
jrubio said:
It is interestinf this effect. I think may be to have the legal responsability under you and by other side be salary from your Company, may be is not a good combination.

:bonk: :bonk:

Well - here in the US the legal responsibility is ultimately in the hands top management. Safety people are generally treated like internal consultants and not held personally responsible if their recommendations are unheeded.

But this is also very frustrating since in poor company cultures management holds the safety guy responsible for injury rate, even though he/she has no real power (or budget) to implement changes.
 

Jen Kirley

Quality and Auditing Expert
Staff member
Admin
#24
atetsade said:
If someone knows off hand, what would the situation be if an employee requested one of these cartridge type respirators, but the OSHA guidelines did not require the employer to provide them?

For instance, our company does plenty of welding. We have direct ventilation/filtering at the welding booths and room filtering above, and the air quality is quite good. I don't know if it has been measured.

However, if you're flux-core welding or using alot of oil based anti-spatter spray, the smoke can be quite noticable. If a welder requests a respirator for his own health, and we are not OSHA required to provide it, does he have to purchase it for himself?

Thank you Jim Wynne and Discordian for your particularly helpful posts. I also vote that this is an excellent discussion.
Great response by Discordian. :applause:

Where smoke is noticeable there may be a question of particulates suspension and exposure. Certainly removing with exhaust ducts is best but check with your state's OSHA office to see if there's a program offering free or reduced price air testing at such questionable work areas. This office is also best positioned to answer your question about supplying a respirator when none is required, especially since it is your company's responsibility to establish the zero requirement based on data.
 

Cari Spears

Super Moderator
Staff member
Super Moderator
#26
Sidney Vianna said:
Put it in the open. When you discuss this openly, rumors tend to stop.
That is good advice in most situations.

Sidney Vianna said:
Also create a sign that says that and strategically place it right there where this individual works (so you can show to visiting customers).
Good idea.
 
B

Bill Pflanz

#27
As someone from the chemical industry where respirators are common, here are my thoughts.

There are many types of respirators and filters that are designed to remove specific particulates. The person voluntarily using a respirator probably does not have enough knowledge to even select the right one for protection. Even if it is the right one, a truly useful respirator must be fitted for the user. Beards are not allowed since it prevents a close fit so it must also be worn properly.

On the legal side, I wonder how much protection you would get from quoting the OSHA regulations about voluntary use of a respirator in a civil suit. By allowing the use of the respirator (which may or may not be the right one and worn properly) the company may look like they are giving an okay for its use. We have had other discussions about employee lawsuits and I could see one occuring if the this employee or co-workers became ill or developed cancer. Whether the lawsuit is successful is up to the jury but I could see it happening.

Bill Pflanz
 
Q

qualeety

#28
had a similar situation in my previous owrk...and this is how we resolved the issue.

1st...JHSC agreed that there is no safety concern and we had a document to prove it
2nd...if an employee wants to wear a respiratory mask then he must
- provide it at his own cost
- wear it 8hrs a day (for his own safety :lol: )
- get a proper fit (he had a moustache..which is no no)

Of course, we told him with a union rep and JHSC chairperson present...at the end of the meeting, he agreed not to wear one...a simple problem but it costed the company about 30+hrs of manhours :mad:
 
D

davis007

#29
If I read the OSHA regs correctly, if an employee wears a cartrige type resperator on the job, the employeer must ensure that he is fit to wear such a device and that the device is in proper working order.

If he continues to wear the unit without the employeer ensuring that these standards are meet, OSHA can fine the employeer.

We had a similar situation at the place I used to work. Initially all employees were fit tested at their anual physical and given a respirator. After several years the company decided that this was overkill. The first step was to take back all the respirators given to my department and instruct us that we were not ALOWED to use a respirator any longer and would no longer be fit tested at our physicals. (Great for me as the things made me closterphobic.) However, as an R&D lab we did on occasion use things that had noxious fumes. After several back and forth meetings with the management on why we would on occasion need to use the respirators, it was agreed that SOME of the lab techs working in the department would be enrolled in a voluntary program. They would be fit tested at their physicals and be issued a respirator. Out of 50 people in the Department we had 4 techs in this program, ONLY these four were allowed to wear a respirator. When experiments were performed that had a bad smelling or potentially dangerous fumes only these four were allowed to perform the actual work.

This was all to save ~$1500 in fit test fees. The funny thing is that no one at the company could figure out how to stop the company doing the physicals from doing the fit test. I had to have one for two more years before they finaly got that stopped.
 
J

jrubio

#30
Discordian said:
Well - here in the US the legal responsibility is ultimately in the hands top management. Safety people are generally treated like internal consultants and not held personally responsible if their recommendations are unheeded.

But this is also very frustrating since in poor company cultures management holds the safety guy responsible for injury rate, even though he/she has no real power (or budget) to implement changes.
-------------------
Yes, although the legal responsibility is directly and generally applied to the employer but in Spain the Safety guy has indirectly civil, penal & Admnistrative responsibility too.

Imagine that you haven not identified a risk and tell to your employer that have meet, and after that a person is injured, of course the Safety guy has the responsibility of this effect.

In Spain there are causes where some guys went to jail due to this. Basically Auditing Civil Engineering

That´s why I have a huge respect for that.

Do you know some examples in the US?
 
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