From time to time Health and Safety Professionals either need to hire an outside organization to provide safety training, or acquire the skills to perform safety training for their company.
Recently a question about Bloodborne Pathogens / Universal Precautions training was asked at one of VSHC Chapter’s meetings. Specifically, the question was about the qualifications required to present training with regard to biohazards as applied to the VOSHA bloodborne pathogen standard.
Under the 29 CFR 1910.1030 Bloodborne Pathogens Standard, Paragraph g) “Communications of hazards to employees,” (2)(n)(viii), states that “someone knowledgeable” needs to do the training. When this question was posed to Dan Whipple, VOSHA Compliance Assistance and VPP Specialist, his response was that… “the trainer should have medical knowledge and that a VOSHA Compliance specialist would determine if training was sufficient.”
This led one Vermont manufacturer to engage a trainer who has a nursing degree and as such, was very knowledgeable about biohazards. Although this company felt that there is enough openness in the regulation for a whole lot of interpretation, they decided to go the “sure thing” route by utilizing the services of a health care professional to provide the training.
There you have it!!!