Occupational Exposure Visualization Comes of Age

Abstract

It has been 20 years since video exposure monitoring (VEM) was embraced as an instrument to provide better documentation of at-risk workers both in Europe and in the United States. Although the first VEM efforts started independently, the passion for this new technology and what it can do to improve the occupational environment has been advanced by a small but growing team of researchers on both sides of the Atlantic. As technology advances over the next ten years, VEM is set to become one of the major instruments in the arsenal of occupational exposure assessment and control. The technical aspects and uses of VEM are reviewed in this issue by some of the key players in these developments (Rosen et al., 2005). In the 1980s a small group of researchers from the engineering control technology branch of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) were working on developing controls to reduce worker exposure to airborne chemicals during batch processing at a manufacturing plant in the Midwest. The research team consisted of a chemical engineer and two occupational hygienists, one specializing in the use of real-time instruments and the other in ergonomics. The diverse talents and skill sets of this team formed a synergy that took advantage of emerging technologies in the portable computer, video and realtime sensor markets (McGlothlin et al., 1987; 1996). The result of the application of this new technology, VEM in the United States was very promising. For the first time, researchers could discern exposure sources and the interaction between work practices and engineering controls such as local exhaust ventilation. Pinpointing exposure sources led to cost effective controls and the development of an effective feedback mechanism for showing workers and management where they had exposures and where they could be controlled. Overlaying videography with the real-time particulate sensors proved very effective. At the same time, unknown to the NIOSH researchers, a like-minded group of researchers at the National Board of Occupational Safety and Health in Sweden (now called the National Institute for Working Life) were considering ways to engage exposed workers in environmental control processes (Rosen and Lundstrom, 1987). The goal of this group was to develop methods for workers to see with their own eyes the potential hazards (in real-time) to which they were being exposed. Computer and video technology were getting less expensive and more portable, and real-time instruments (in the United States the instrument was the handheld aerosol monitor or HAM) were being used for particulate monitoring. By visualizing the work being done and combining it with real-time monitoring, occupational hygienists had a formula for success. They could provide a convenient means of feedback for workers and management and they had a new weapon to ‘see’ exposure sources and targeting controls. As the benefits of this new occupational exposure assessment method became obvious, other NIOSH researchers applied this method to their projects, resulting in a popular NIOSH government publication titled ‘Analyzing workplace exposure using direct reading instruments and video exposure monitoring techniques’, (CDC/NIOSH, 1992). Researchers for the National Institute for Working Life in Sweden identified two methodologies to evaluate worker exposure to air contaminants, one of which was commercialized (Walsh, 2002). From 1980 through the 1990s NIOSH researchers explored different ways to use this technology. They concluded that while the technology was unique, it would primarily be used to *Tel: +1 765 469 6359; fax: +1 765 496 1377; e-mail: jdm3@purdue.edu