Your eyes are one of the most vulnerable parts of the body in a lab setting, and eye injuries are among the most common and preventable incidents in research environments.
At the bench, it’s all too easy to be splashed with a corrosive or a solvent, but it’s not just about liquids. Vapors and aerosols can easily burn or irritate. Infectious agents or other biological matter can also spray you or others nearby. Always be wary of other physical hazards, such as shattered glass or other flying debris, or even intense light and radiation sources, like UV lamps, lasers, or invisible electromagnetic (EM) emissions.
Per the Johns Hopkins Chemical Hygiene plan, eye protection is mandatory wherever recognized eye hazards are present. The Principal Investigator or lab supervisor is responsible for choosing and providing the correct level of protection required.
- Only choose ANSI Z87.1 certified eyewear, and verify that protection matches your lab’s risks
- Ensure proper fit, both for comfort, as well as to maximize protective potential
- Regularly check your eyewear for damage. Scratches and cracks can fail very quickly, so replace your eyewear as soon as necessary
It’s important to wear eye protection, but just as important to choose the right protection for the job.
Safety Glasses with impact-resistant side shields are suitable for general work and can protect from flying particles and moderate splashing. Some designs can also include prescription lenses.
Chemical Splash Goggles seal tightly to the face and can protect against large splashes. Some may be rated to protect from vapors.
Laser/UV/IR Glasses are engineered to filter out specific EM wavelengths and overexposure that may do damage eye tissue, including the retina.
Face shields provide full-face coverage and provide extra splash and impact protection. These cannot be worn alone and must be paired with safety glasses or goggles.
Remember, personal protective equipment is only useful when you wear it. It is not a substitute for proper planning, use of engineering controls, administrative controls, training, and standard operating procedures. If eye protection has been assigned for a certain activity, make sure you wear it appropriately. If you find you are not using the assigned eye protection, discuss with your supervisor or lab manager to find what roadblocks are keeping you from their use.
This might include:
- Not having enough eye protection for the number of lab members needing it concurrently (solution: obtain more units for the lab)
- Not remembering because it’s in a drawer somewhere (solution: keep it stored near the location where it is used)
- Having difficulty seeing while wearing it (solution: you may need a prescription solution or an alternate engineering control, administrative control, or PPE that will still protect you while allowing you to view your experiment)
When in doubt, discuss with your supervisor or the Occupational and Environmental Safety office.