Industrial Hygiene and OSHA
What is Industrial Hygiene?
Industrial hygiene is the science of protecting and improving the health and safety of people at work. It involves understanding and controlling environmental and physical factors that could harm workers. When OSHA sets safety standards, the process includes identifying how much exposure employees have to hazards and what steps are necessary to reduce or eliminate those risks.
How are OSHA and Industrial Hygiene Related?
Under the Occupational Safety and Health Act , OSHA creates and enforces required safety and health standards for over 6 million workplaces across the United States. To help carry out these responsibilities, OSHA depends on experts like industrial hygienists, or "IHs." These professionals play a key role in making sure workplaces are safe. In fact, more than 40% of OSHA’s compliance officers are IHs.
What is Industrial Hygiene
What do Industrial Hygienists (IHs) do?
Industrial hygienists are primarily trained to identify and control health risks in the workplace, such as chemical, physical, biological, and ergonomic dangers, that could make workers sick or cause discomfort before they become serious. To do that, they perform the following important responsibilities:
- They use a systematic approach—anticipation, recognition, evaluation, and control—to manage these environmental risk factors.
- They conduct workplace assessments using quantitative tools (e.g., air sampling, noise dosimetry) and qualitative methods (e.g., worker interviews, hazard observations).
- They recommend control measures aligned with the hierarchy of controls (HOC): elimination, substitution, engineering controls, warnings, administrative/work practice controls, and PPE.
- They inspect workplaces for compliance with OSHA standards and American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists (ACGIH) Threshold Limit Values (TLVs) and Biological Exposure Indices (BEIs), which are science-based guidelines for occupational exposure to chemical substances, physical agents, and biological hazards.
- They also emphasize worker education and involvement to foster a culture of safety and ensure early identification of hazards.
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1-1. What is the primary role of industrial hygienists (IHs)?
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