my previous job (which was also my last job pre-transition but that’s just a coincidence) involved writing maintenance and diagnostic scripts for a series of medical laboratory analyzers that had been in the market for like 15 years by that point. if you’re in the business you’ll recognize the company name but it’s not important here.
what was important was that as a result of working on these machines, the office had several literal clinical-chemistry labs with several of them set up to do QA and such. i didn’t have to go into the lab very often, but because i did, i had to take all the trainings on how to properly use the lab space. things like proper use of PPE, how to handle a sample, various types of hazards, etc.
one of the most useful ones mentioned the Hierarchy of Hazard Controls: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hierarchy_of_hazard_controls
basically, there are tiers of approaches to accommodating a hazard and ensuring the safety of the humans who need to work around them. from most- to least-effective, they are:
- physically removing the hazard to render it impossible
- substituting a hazardous situation with an equivalent, less-hazardous one
- creating a physical separation between the worker and the hazard, like a fume hood or a guard rail
- implementing a procedure or a ruleset to manage the hazard, like requiring training
- providing Personal Protective Equipment for the workers to mitigate the hazard, like hearing protection or respirators
the early items are considered better than the later ones because they rely less on the attentiveness of the workers to ensure safety. the more you can render a hazard moot, the better work you can perform without having to worry about accommodating a hazardous situation.
