mrsoshasafety

Respirators protect workers from a variety of hazards—chemical, biological and radiation.  Some of these hazards involve immediate life-threatening or may protect workers from hazards when performing ordinary tasks.

The goal of the respirator is to seal off and isolate the wearer’s respiratory system.  This allows work  to be performed in a hazardous atmosphere

To correctly select the proper respirator, it is necessary to know what airborne hazards are present in the work environment.

National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) approves respirators and respirators fall in 3 main categories.

1.      Particulate Filtering Facepiece Respirators (Usually discarded when done—sometimes called N95 respirators.)

The N95 respirator is the most commonly used respirator. N95 translates:  not resistant to oil and filters against 95% of the airborne particles. (See table below.)

2.   Elastomeric Respirators (Reusable)

3.   Powered Air-Purifying Respirators (PAPR)

*High Efficiency Particulate Air.

The two most common types of Particle filtering respirators are filtering and elastomeric.  Elastomeric respirators have a facepiece and replaceable cartridges.

If your respirator is NIOSH approved, it has a NIOSH approval number.  Usually this number is found on the packaging, not on the respirator itself.  Both an approval label and instructions come with all NIOSH-approved respirators.

OSHA has a great video showing how to put on, wear and take off respirators.  Click here for free training video.  http://tinyurl.com/yhdu9n4

If your employees need to wear respirators, your company needs a respirator policy that meets federal or state guidelines.