Biohazards in the Workplace

In 2004, around 1:30 PM Custodian Debbie Rothwell, was called in to clean up the bloody scene of a student that shot himself in the head inside the schools main entrance, according to http://caselaw.findlaw.com/. Rothwell will probably call December 10 her worst day on the job. Rothwell had to remove medical supplies, brain matter, pieces of bone, and blood in the hallway. Within a few years, Rothwell filed suit against the District and Superintendent Green in 2007 claiming post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

There are companies trained and prepared in the field of biohazard remediation to handle a scenario like Rothwell’s. Associations like American Bio Recovery Association (ABRA) offers a list of companies nationwide that are able to provide this type of service.

As a Certified Bio Recovery Master (CBRM), certified by ABRA, Scott Vogel, of Emergi-Clean Inc. has seen countless incidences in his 15 years.  When a remediation job revolving around a child’s death comes in you can always expect a heightened emotional reaction within your employees. Being a new father he states the emotional toll it can take on himself and/or an individual, even though we are trained can be hard to cope with. Being experienced doesn’t mean we can detach ourselves emotionally. He can only imagine how it feels for someone coming in on an incident without professional training. Other people in the industry feel the same way.

“Even if you have employees that are trained in handling blood that can fully comply with CFR 1910.1030, it is not worth the risk to expose them to the mental anguish of cleaning blood or OPIM (other potentially infectious materials),” Eric Morse, CBRM, President of Tri-State Bio Recovery stated. “This can cause severe emotional damage and will overall be bad for employee morale.”

There is a lot more involved with biohazard remediation only a trained professional should provide. If the scene isn’t cleaned properly it continues to be a health hazard for anyone that comes into contact with the area.

“Many however, try and get away with what is in the minimum standard unknowingly or knowingly putting profits ahead of proper training,” Thomas Licker, CBRM, CEICR stated from Biological Safety, Biohazard and Trauma Scene Cleaning Contractors.

If you choose to hire a contractor or other professional service provider to do the clean up, make sure the contractor has experience, and the third party credentials documenting his ability to perform this remediation. Check their references and ask the company for a proper insurance certificate.

In 20 years running a family owned and operated business, we have seen several cases that dealt with the improper handling or dealing of bio hazard scenes. Not only did their actions put the public at risk, but also their workers who weren’t taught the proper way of biohazard remediation. We here at Emergi-Clean Inc. have partnered up with ehs Inc. to conduct environmental, health, and safety training throughout the tri-state area and across the nation specializing in Bio Hazard Remediation.  All of our employees are current with OSHA 1910.1030 and HAZWOPER 1910.120 and a third party certification from the American Bio Recovery Association. Please be aware of those you hire.

 

Emergi-Clean and ehsInc announce an affinity partnership

Emergi-Clean Inc. is proud to announce an affinity partnership with ehs International, Inc. (ehsInc) http://ehsinc.org, a workplace safety compliance, education, and curriculum design firm. Emergi-Clean Inc. (ECI) is a family owned and operated business for over 20 years http://emergiclean.com ECI specializes in bio remediation and bio recovery, including specialty services such as crime scene cleanup and industrial accidents. ehsInc has provided high quality safety education since 1997 providing  onsite training, consulting, and curriculum design.

Workplace safety has become vital for companies, to ensure the health of their employees and remain in compliance with Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) rules. ECI and ehsInc have come together in order to provide their clients with the expertise and support they truly need.

Emergi-Clean Inc.’s staff includes ABRA Certified Technicians, NJ State Certified Medical Technicians, Firefighters, Certified Instructors, and OSHA Trained employees. ehsInc is comprised of industry experts who are driven to provide onsite compliance, education and program development across the nation with one common goal; protecting our workforce for future generations.

“We came together to form this partnership because we both wanted to provide added value to our clients. What Ron Vogel and Scott Vogel understands is that the bio hazards industry needs support when it comes to safety management,” stated Marjorie Del Toro, President and CEO of ehsInc., “Together with Emergi-Clean we have expanded our reach to the East Coast. Our companies complement each other. It is an affinity partnership where we have agreed to exclusively offer our services to our clients. Our clients will now have one place to go, allowing our respective services to be much more comprehensive.”

Emergi-Clean chose ehsInc as their ongoing partner because the company does not believe in a blanket approach to safety issues. ehsInc provides high quality services by tailoring their educational programs and compliance services to the specific needs of each company, which reflects the focus of Emergi-Clean Inc. Scott Vogel explained.

“ehsInc’s CEO Marjorie has a passion when she talks about the company,” Scott Vogel, Director of Operations stated. “When she speaks about the avenue of training she has an intelligence that makes her stand out more than the rest of the companies.”

The partnership provides a wider service reach and a state of the art East Coast Training Center in New Jersey.  Additionally, it will ensure the continued success of both firms all the while bringing better training options to the tri-state area which includes New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania.

For additional information, visit:  http://emergiclean.com and http://ehsinc.org.

 

 

Why it’s essential to have a biohazard remediation company on hand

On December 10 2004, around 1:30 PM, Custodian Debbie Rothwell received a call in what would turn into her worst day on the job. Upon her arrival she was shocked to see the bloody scene of a student that shot himself in the head inside the schools main entrance, according to  http://caselaw.findlaw.com/. Rothwell had to remove medical supplies, brain matter, pieces of bone, and blood in the hallway.

Within a few years, Rothwell filed suit against the District and Superintendent Green in 2007. Her claim was that she was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The case was dismissed claiming pursuant CR 12 (b)(6) asserting her claims were precluded by the exclusivity provision of the IIA because her claimed injury occurred during the course of her employment. The trial court granted the District’s motion and dismissed the action with prejudice, and her lawsuit was reinstated in 2009.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention stated in 2013, suicide is the tenth leading cause of death for all ages in the United States. 8% of students have attempted suicide one or more times within 12 months. With these statistics there could be more cases like Rothwells. Especially because there are many custodians that aren’t fully trained or equipped to handle such a clean-up, emotionally.

There are companies trained and prepared in the field of biohazard remediation to handle a scenario like Rothwells. There is a lot more involved with biohazard remediation, and only a trained professional should provide the service, and many custodians and workers aren’t. If the blood isn’t cleaned up properly, it becomes a health hazard for anyone that comes into contact with it. Only a trained professional with proper tools, equipment, and properly used disinfectants can truly make the area or item safe. There has to be a proper clearance test in order to verify if the contaminated surface was disinfected. The clearance test proves that disinfection has been done properly and that the surface is safe to touch without the need to worry about it, according to American Bio Recovery Association (ABRA).

If you choose to hire a contractor or other professional service provider to do the clean up, make sure the contract has experience cleaning the issues. Check their references and ask the contractor to follow the recommendations in the EPA guide on the epa.gov website.

CEO of Emergi-Clean Inc gets International Certification (CBRM)

Rahway, NJ – Emergi-Clean, Inc is proud to announce that our company CEO Ronald Vogel has achieved the highest level of certification through the American Bio Recovery Association (ABRA). The American Bio Recovery Association is an international non-profit educational association that sets forth guideline standards in the Bio Recovery field. Vogel is now qualified as a Certified Bio Recovery Master (CBRM) technician after meeting very strict criteria mandated by ABRA. This certification of CBRM has only been given out to a few individuals nationwide. Some of the criteria required were a minimum of 10 years of bio recovery remediation, an OSHA 40 hour Hazwoper certification, OSHA 10-hour construction safety, and health training, verifiable third party accreditation in Occupational Safety or other field related to sanitation and public health.

Other Rodents

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Rodents multiply swiftly, and infestations may be extremely difficult to exterminate.

Identify and Prevent Rodent Infestations. You may never see a mouse or rat unless an infestation is severe. Look for signs of rat or mouse infestation: Rodent droppings around food packages, in drawers or cupboards, and under the sink. Nesting material such as shredded paper, fabric, or dried plant matter.
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Bat Cleanups

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If you have bats in the attic of your home or building, then you have large piles of guano, or waste, as well. Besides making your house smell bad, guano can cause a lung infection called histoplasmosis that is caused by inhaling the spores of a fungus that is carried in bat guano. Pests, such as cockroaches, are also attracted to guano, causing even more infestation. In addition, the droppings and urine can corrode wood and drywall.
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Dry Ice Blasting

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Dry Ice blasting is safe alternative to traditional cleaning methods is used for mold mitigation, fire restoration, graffiti removal and much more. A non-abrasive, non-conductive, non-poisonous cleaning process that uses a compressed air system with soft dry ice pellets that vaporizes on impact causing no secondary waste but removing over 99.9% of the contaminant. This process uses frozen Carbon Dioxide “dry ice” pellets that turn into gas upon impact causing the contaminant to break into small chips and fall to the ground. Since no abrasive chemicals are used this process is ideal to use in settings where there are young, elderly or sick people. The most common uses for dry ice blasting are graffiti removal, smoke damage, mold remediation and high grade adhesive removal. Please visit www.coldjet.com to find out other uses.

CO2 blasting employs 3 core factors:

  1. pellet kinetic energy
  2. thermal shock effect
  3. thermal-kinetic effect

Dry Ice Blasting optimizes blast performance by combining these forces and adjusting:

  • compressed air pressure
  • blast nozzle type (velocity distribution)
  • CO2 pellet size and density
  • pellet mass rate
  • flux density (particles per unit area per second)
  • Pellet Kinetic Energy

Pellet Kinetic Force

The Dry Ice Blasting process incorporates high velocity (supersonic) nozzles for surface preparation and coating removal applications.

Since kinetic impact force is a product of the pellet mass and velocity over time, the Dry Ice Blasting achieves the greatest impact force possible from a solid CO2 pellet by propelling the pellets to the highest velocities attainable in the blasting industry.

Even at high impact velocities and direct head-on impact angles, the kinetic effect of solid CO2 pellets is minimal when compared to other media (grit, sand, PMB).

This is due to the relative softness of a solid CO2, which is not as dense and hard, as other projectile media. Also, the pellet changes phase from a solid to a gas almost instantaneously upon impact, which effectively provides an almost nonexistent coefficient of restitution in the impact equation.

Very little impact energy is transferred into the coating or substrate, so the Dry Ice Blasting blasting process is considered to be nonabrasive.

Thermal Shock Effect

Instantaneous sublimation (phase change from solid to gas) of CO2 pellet upon impact absorbs maximum heat from the very thin top layer of surface coating or contaminant. Maximum heat is absorbed due to latent heat of sublimation.

The very rapid transfer of heat into the pellet from the coating top layer creates an extremely large temperature differential between successive micro-layers within the coating. This sharp thermal gradient produces localized high shear stresses between the micro-layers. The shear stresses produced are also dependent upon the coating thermal conductivity and thermal coefficient of expansion / contraction, as well as the thermal mass of the underlying substrate.

The high shear produced over a very brief expanse of time causes rapid micro-crack propagation between the layers leading to contamination and/or coating final bond failure at the surface of the substrate.

Thermal-Kinetic Effect

The combined impact energy dissipation and extremely rapid heat transfer between the pellet and the surface cause instantaneous sublimation of the solid CO2 into gas. The gas expands to nearly 800 times the volume of the pellet in a few milliseconds in what is effectively a “Micro-explosion” at the point of impact.

The “Micro-explosion,” as the pellet changes to gas, is further enhanced for lifting thermally-fractured coating particles from the substrate. This is because of the pellet’s lack of rebound energy, which tends to distribute its mass along the surface during the impact. The CO2 gas expands outward along the surface and its resulting “explosion shock front” effectively provides an area of high pressure focused between the surface and the thermally fractured coating particles. This results in a very efficient lifting force to carry the particles away from the surface.
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Hoarding

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Hoarding is a problem that is both an emotional and health related concern. Our staff have been trained in working closely with individuals in a compassionate way to ensure that all problems are resolved appropriately. Due to the emotional toll that hoarding can take on a family our staff will work closely with all parties involved. Hoarding is not just an issue of removing debris as there can be hidden damage underneath. We will aid in the removal of all debris, treat any contaminated areas and then restore the area to a livable state.
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Animal Infestation / Hoarding

Having a pet or two can be one of the most wonderful things in life. Animals have an unconditional love for their owners and most times owners have an unconditional love for their pets. However, sometimes there comes a point where the animals become too much for the owner to keep up with the maintenance. Animal urine and fecal matter are difficult to clean with household products due to enzymes that may be left behind. Our staff is compassionate and understanding of the importance of your pets. We use special enzymatic cleaners to clean the area to remove the biological enzymes and smells that are left behind.

Sewage / Water Mitigation

Sewage includes any liquid or solid that contains fecal matter, pathogens or other microorganisms that can cause diseases. When an area is affected with sewage it is important to identify all contaminated areas so that all areas can be treated. There are some materials that once exposed to sewage cannot be properly decontaminated and must be disposed of properly. Our staff will work closely with you and inform you of any belongings that will need to be removed. Once all biological contamination is corrected the area will be properly restored and sealed with Smart Shield ™ to deter mold growth.

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