Chemical agent monitor

Mini-Cam Miniature chemical agent monitor (Military). 

MONITORING Available monitoring equipment for agent GD is the Automatic Chemical Agent Detector Alarm (ACADA), bubblers (GC method), and Chemical Agent Monitor (CAM). 

A wide variety of commercial equipment is available for detection of hazardous chemicals, including a number of chemical warfare agents. For example, ion mobility spectroscopy is used to detect nerve, blister, and blood agents. The Chemical Agent Monitor is a portable, hand-held point detection instrument that uses ion mobility spectrometry to monitor nerve or blister agent vapors. However, minimum detection limits are approximately 100 times the acceptable exposure limit for nerve agents, and approximately 50 times the acceptable exposure limit for blister agents. 

Results Issues surrounding the safety of using miniature chemical agent monitors (MINICAMS) were addressed, and a modified method was developed for sampling a hydrogen-based atmosphere. This modification does not require the manufacture of any component and is readily implemented in the field. 

The National Institute of Justice has put together multivolume compendiums of instrumentation relevant to chemical and biological weapons detection. However, none of these books contains a critical review of the effectiveness of the technologies. One instrument included in the publication is a portable, handheld, ion mobility spectrometry chemical agent monitor with moderate to high selectivity, but only when used in open spaces, far from vapor sources such as smoke, cleaning compounds, and fumes. This would seem to make it useless in the battlefield. Another listed chemical agent monitor has a below 5% false positive rate. With one in 20 false positives, no one could reasonably act upon an alarm. 

The GID-3 is a British-made IMS for battlefield detection of the most common chemical agents. The GID-2A is a similar device designed for fixed locations and unattended operation. It is very portable and rugged. In the United States, it is known as the XM22 ACADA (Figure 4). The related chemical agent monitor (CAM) handheld unit operates on... 

Risk, D., Verpy, D., Conley, J.D., Jacobson, T., Sawyer, T.W. (2001). Volatile anesthetics give a false-positive reading in chemical agent monitors in the H mode. Mil. Med. 166 708-10. 

CAM The chemical agent monitor (CAM) is a product of Graseby Dynamics, Ltd. It... 

ICAM The improved chemical agent monitor (ICAM) is a product of the Joint CBD... 

Details on Airborne Chemical Agent Monitoring Methods and Standards... 

Recommendation 5. The Army should maintain conservative chemical demilitarization exhaust stack and in-plant airborne agent exposure thresholds. If current limits for exposure to stockpiled chemical agents are further reduced, the Army should not further reduce existing monitoring thresholds unless chemical agent monitors can be made both more sensitive and more specific so that lower thresholds can be instituted without significant increases in false positive alarm rates or unless health risk assessments demonstrate that lower thresholds are necessary to protect workers or the public. 

The SERPACWA has no vapors, and so it does not register a false alarm with the automatic vapor detectors, such as the Improved Chemical Agent Monitor (ICAM). It also does not register with systems that detect chemical liquid, such as M8 or M9 paper. The SERPACWA paste on the surface of M8 or M9 paper will prevent CWA absorption by the paper and render it ineffective. 

If the medical treatment facility (MTF) or hospital becomes contaminated with chemical agent, not only does it become useless to render care, but it also exposes the staff and all other patients to chemical contamination. All precautions must be used to avoid this issue. Only very limited access to the hospital or MTF should be permitted. At most, only one or two entrances to the hospital should be used by incoming patients and employees. At these entrances, proof of decontamination or noncontamination, in the form of checking the individual with a chemical agent monitor (CAM) for contamination, must be presented before admission. AU other entrances must be locked down. Security guards posted on the inside of aU entrances would prevent unauthorized entrance from outside. Remember, people exiting the hospital could hold the door open to admit contaminated individuals from the outside. 

In the military environment, chemical detectors are often deployed to confirm that decontamination has been completed before casualties are passed via an air-lock into a Collective Protection Environment . The reason for this is obvious staff in the Collective Protection Environment do not wear personal protective equipment (PPE) and must be protected by rigorous maintenance of an uncontaminated environment. The Chemical Agent Monitor (CAM) is particularly suited for detecting vapour given off by unremoved areas of liquid contamination. However, proper monitoring of patients takes several minutes and in a mass-casualty or mass-decontamination setting this may not be feasible. Reliance must, therefore, be placed on the adequacy of the decontamination process itself. 

Monitoring, which detects contamination on a casualty either before or after decontamination, uses close-range detection such as the chemical agent monitor (CAM) which uses ion-drift technology to monitor contamination at close range on victims and their surroundings. 

Two M258A1 or M291 decon kits per person. Four M1 chemical agent monitors (CAMS). 

---