Heather Jackson, M.S., CHMM, CSP

Assistant Director of Chemical Safety and Environmental Compliance

Striving for Laboratory Safety Excellence-Without a Lot of

Resources

Program Credits

• Kevin Cisner, CSP- UIC Lab Safety Coordinator-an invaluable leader of the UIC lab safety program

• We could not have made these improvements without his technical expertise, hard work, and passion for safety

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Presentation Objectives

• Provide strategies to improve safety training compliance at your University

• Provide strategies to increase engagement of Principal Investigators (PIs) in the lab safety program

• Highlight useful lab safety tools for PIs and lab employees

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UIC Organization

• Approximately 450 Principal Investigators, 36 departments which perform scientific research

• Laboratory Safety (part of the Environmental, Health, and Safety Office) falls under the Vice Chancellor for Administrative Services

• Institutional Biosafety Committee, Institutional Review Board, Animal Care Committee completely separate under the Vice Chancellor for Research

UIC Organization

• No oversight or monitoring of laboratory safety by University senior leadership

• Disconnect between Administrative Services and the research community

• Not the organizational model advocated by the

Chemical Safety Board

Strategies to Increase PI Engagement in the Lab Safety Program

Identified PI Lab Safety Responsibilities

•Laboratory Safety Management-far from intuitive

•Created a one-page document to tell the PI what they should do to create a safer laboratory

• Document reviewed by UIC Legal Council-endorsement of UIC Legal Council added credibility

Substances Develop Lab Emergency Procedures and SOPs for Particularly Hazardous Substances

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UIC PI Responsibilities for Laboratory Safety

•Provide and Document Training•Complete Lab Hazard/PPE Assessment and Provide PPE•Complete UIC Chemicals of Concern Survey•Develop Lab Emergency Procedures and SOPs for Particularly Hazardous Substances•Post Updated Lab ID Card and Hazard Placard

Substances Develop Lab Emergency Procedures and SOPs for Particularly Hazardous Substances

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UIC PI Responsibilities for Lab Safety

• Report and Investigate all Injuries• Provide Access to Safety Data Sheets• Provide and Maintain Required Engineered Controls• Correct Hazards in a Timely Fashion• Hold Employees Accountable for Complying with Safety Procedures

Substances Develop Lab Emergency Procedures and SOPs for Particularly Hazardous Substances

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Key Initiative-Lab Safety Responsibilities for Principal Investigators Course

• Wanted to highlight the UCLA tragedy and legal consequences to get PIs more engaged in lab safety

• Created a “mandatory” training course for PIs

• Stressed this course was to help protect the PI from legal liability and increase laboratory safety

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Key Initiative-Lab Safety Responsibilities for Principal Investigators Course

• Highlighted lab safety accidents from across the country and played Chemical Safety board video “Experimenting with Danger”

• Folders distributed containing key documents for PIs

• Reviewed PI responsibility document and tools available to help the PI.

• Stressing that we create safety tools to help the researcher meet their responsibilities was key

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Criminal Defense ULCA Professor

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Professor Patrick Harren’s Trial

Laboratory Accidents

A death in the labFatality adds further momentum to calls for a shake-up in academic safety culture.

'A TRUE TRAGEDY': Yale student asphyxiated in lathe accident at chemistry lab, medical examiner rules

Laboratory Accidents

Blast probe finds 20 safety violationsTexas Tech investigators have linked a Jan. 7 laboratory explosion that severely injured a doctoral candidate to 20 surrounding violations of the university’s safety policy, according to documents released Monday.

Laboratory Accidents

• Lab Fire at UIC’s College of Pharmacy

Strategies to Improve Lab Safety Training Compliance

• Lab Safety Training Matrix- goal to aid researchers in identifying what lab safety training is needed.

• Identifies training needed based on the activities a lab worker performs

• Modeled after a UCLA document

• Received a lot of positive feedback on this document

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Laboratory Training Matrix

Exactly Who Needs Lab Safety Training?

• 2010- Records existed of who we trained but no idea how many people should be trained

• Goal-identify the universe of individuals requiring safety training

• No good data source on lab workers-included a lot of people who didn’t actually work in labs

• We had to “take a census” to identify our lab workers and PIs

Lab Worker Census

• Labor Intensive-36 different departments to approach

• For departments where our data was OK, we sent our list of PIs and lab workers from the Onsite database and asked for corrections

• Where our data was very lacking, we asked the department for a list of PIs and lab workers

• All lab worker and PI names entered in Onsite database

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Training Deficiency Reports Drove Compliance

• Lab Safety Training Deficiency Reports- identify individuals who have not met safety training requirements

• Issued to individual lab workers and Department Heads

• The deficiency reports were a game changer-Department Heads and PIs generally did not ignore deficiency reports

• Created the need to add several additional training sessions throughout the year

Training Statistics

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Year

Number of Lab

Employees Trained

Number of PIs TrainedOn PI Responsibilities

2010 118 0

2011 180 0

2012 738 187

2013 767 172

Totals 1802 416

Lab worker training compliance rate rose from 10% to 70%. Current PI training compliance rate is 80%.

Less Labor Intensive Training Strategies

•Outreach to key departments was incredibly helpful to achieve high training compliance rates.

•Chemistry Dept.- Lab Safety training part of required new employee orientation. 100 % training compliance achieved in the Chemistry Dept.

•Physics and Pharmacy- Lab Safety training a required departmental seminar

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Useful Lab Safety Tools for PIs and Lab Employees

UIC “Chemicals of Concern” Survey

• Conducting full chemical inventories at UIC would be very difficult-no teeth to enforce requirement.

•PI are asked to complete the “UIC Chemicals of Concern” survey. This is a list of high risk and chemicals regulated by:• US Department of Homeland Security (DHS)• US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) • US Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA)

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UIC Chemicals of Concern Survey

• The UIC Chemical of Concerns Survey identifies:

- Toxic Gases- Explosives- Pyrophoric Materials- OSHA Regulated Carcinogens- Class A and B Peroxides- Chemicals Regulated by the DHS (low thresholds)- OSHA Regulated Toxic Substances- EPA Extremely Hazardous Substances (low

thresholds)

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UIC Chemicals of Concern Survey

• Only included EPCRA and DHS regulated chemicals with low thresholds.

• All lab employees must be notified if any of these high risk chemicals are present in the lab, the hazards associated with the chemical, and appropriate precautions.

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Laboratory Hazard Assessment Tool

• Developed a UIC Hazard Assessment Tool.

• This document informs laboratory workers of the different types of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) they need to wear for the specific tasks they perform in the laboratory.

• Completion audited during lab inspection process.

Laboratory Hazard Assessment Tool

Lab PPE Guide

MSDS Online

• UIC cited by the Illinois Department of Labor for not providing appropriate access to MSDS

• MSDSonline-MSDS management system

• The MSDSonline database allows each PI to create an “e-binder” of their MSDS.

• If internet is lost, the MSDSonline company can provide backup copies.

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Questions?

Heather Jackson, M.S., CHMM, CSP

Assistant Director of Chemical Safety and Environmental Compliance

E-mail: heather9@uic.edu

Phone: (312) 413-9706

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