Protective Equipment in Pharmaceutical Industry

In the pharmaceutical and healthcare industry, the use of cytotoxic drugs is very common. Though cytotoxic drugs are used to manufacture many useful medicines, what people are not aware of is that its toxicity can have a significant effect on workers, pharmacists, and other healthcare professionals who work on them. 

Along with the continuous exposure to the chemicals, the greatest hazards occur due to contact with dust, liquids, aerosol formation, or when containers containing cytostatic are accidentally dropped. The workers are exposed to several side effects like abdominal pain, vomiting, and allergic reactions. To ensure the safety of employees and protect them from these kinds of hazards, it is important to follow some preventive measures.

It is important that management should implement safe working methods and reassess procedures in response to changing conditions like the emergence of new hazards. Employees should also be trained and educated to accept responsibility of identifying risk situations and taking necessary safety precautions when needed. One of the best ways to avoid accidents and prevent your employees from a hazard is to provide personal protective equipment and make them aware to use it in a proper manner. Let’s discuss some important measures to choose the right PPE.

Choosing the Optimum PPE

If you are looking forward to ensure the safety of your workers in the pharmaceutical industry, protective clothing is the right choice. It is a final line of defence when it comes to protecting personnel from toxic substances. It is created to prevent the body from coming into direct contact with hazardous chemicals and dust. It also plays a vital role in protecting the manufacturing process from human contamination that includes hair, shedding skin, and clothing fibres. It is one of the crucial safety measures that cannot be compromised. Few factors that should be considered when choosing coveralls and protective garments:

Protection from Particle Intrusion – When working with a cytostatic barrier, efficiency against migrating particles is a crucial performance feature. It is very important to determine the level of protection from particle intrusion. A Type 5 test specifies the minimum requirement for chemical protective clothing resistant by airborne solid particles. Those coveralls that have passed the Type 5 test offer a certain level of protection against fine particulates. Make sure that you choose a coverall that offers the lowest level of inward leakage for the best possible protection when working with cytostatic drugs.

Material – While selecting protective clothing, the material is one of the most important factors to look for. There are three common types of material, microporous film (MPF), spun bond – melt blown – spun bond (SMS) and Tyvek, it’s a synthetic material made out of flash spun high-density polyethylene fibres. MPF is made using a spun bond polypropylene and a film of polyethylene. SMS is a breathable material but has poor liquid repellency that’s why it is not suitable for cleanroom environments. Tyvek is made of ultrafine endless high-density polyethylene fibres using specific spinning and bonding technology. You can choose the clothing with the best material as per your requirements.

Comfort – Another important factor while looking for protection wear is comfort. It is very important to be comfortable while wearing clothing as workers would require them to wear entire time while working. Also, if the clothing is comfortable, workers are more willing to wear protective garments. Make sure that the garments should be designed taking care of the durability and allow better movement and flexibility, without compromising safety. Also, the fabric should offer sufficiently high levels of permeability to air and water vapor both to allow it to breathe.

Some Other Features for Protective Wear

Protective clothing must also comply with the following requirements:

• Liquid-tight at arms and front
• Long sleeves
• Closed at the front
• Tight seal at cuffs
• Barrier against cytostatic as well as fine particles
• Smooth surface

These are a few important factors that should be in consideration when selecting the right protective clothing. So, if you want your employees or workers to work in a safe environment, you should buy good quality safety clothing for them. If you are planning to buy the one online, browse through our website moglix.com where you can get the best safety clothing at the best price. You can also get some of the top brands like Jonson, Kasa Life, KT, Mallcom, Nova safe, Safari, STEC, UFO and many more.