Personnel decontamination

Decontamination Personnel affected by CS in field concentrations should... 

The chemical and physical compatibility of decontamination solutions or other decontamination materials must be determined before use. Any decontamination method that permeates, degrades, damages, or otherwise impairs the functioning of the personal protective equipment (PPE) is incompatible with such PPE and should not be used. If a decontamination method does pose a direct health hazard, measures must be taken to protect both decontamination personnel and the workers being decontaminated. Figure 16.22 presents a decision aid for the evaluation of health and safety aspects of decontamination methods. 

Decontaminate personnel, equipment, and fire equipment Incident Commander... 

Patients presenting to healthcare facilities with dermal contamination pose a potential risk to healthcare personnel. Contaminated patients should not gain entrance into the healthcare facility prior to decontamination. Personnel involved in the dermal decontamination may need to don personal protective equipment. Most chemical exposures do not pose a risk of secondary exposure. For exposures that occur in the workplace, Material Safety Data Sheets can be obtained and either the local poison center or the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry can be contacted to obtain advice on what level of protection is appropriate. Contaminated clothing and valuables should be placed in an impervious bag to avoid potential of gassing. 

Nerve Agents- Decontamination of patients. The importance of early decontamination can not be over emphasized. Decontamination of the skin should be accomplished quickly if it is to be fully effective. Liquid agent may be removed by fullers earth or chemically inactivated by the use of reactive decontaminants. Decontamination personnel should wear a mask and protective equipment while decontamination is performed. Once a casualty has been decontaminated, or the agent fully removed, no further risk of contamination exists. The casualty s body fluids, urine, or feces do not present a chemical warfare (CW) hazard. 

France and West Germany have pursued a more traditional approach. Both have established units of NBC defence spedahsts and attached them to their front-line forces. Both have invested in a wide array of decontamination apparatus. The French have a trailer-mounted system in service, which carries 600 litres of a decontaminant solution and uses a high pressure pump to decontaminate personnel, equipment and enclosed spaces. They also have apparatus for decontaminating terrain, the temporary decontamination of equipment and clothing, and held showers for the temporary decontamination of personnel. Equally extensive is the range of equipment possessed by the Bundeswehr. All vehicle crews are equipped to provide limited immediate decontamination of the points of contact on their vehicles. 

Table App. L3 Decontaminating personnel following the spill of a radioactive agent ...

Discard all contaminated clothing. Decontaminate personnel and equipment using approved procedures. 

Rescuers should ensure complete and effective decontamination of themselves by trained Haz Mat personnel as soon as possible after exposure. They should not delay seeking vital medical care if immediate decontamination is not possible. 

If a rescue is made of a contaminated, or possibly contaminated person, it is very important to prevent the spread of the contaminant. If at all possible the victim should be decontaminated, to the best of your ability, at the scene. After the decontamination, the victim, and the rescuers, will still be considered to be contaminated. If at all possible the victim should be transported by personnel who have not entered the contaminated area. 

After the victim has been transported to the hospital the ambulance vehicle must be decontaminated by trained personnel. 

All personnel involved in the rescue and subsequent transport must be decontaminated and should be medi-ceiUy monitored. The vehicle must not be returned to regular service until it has been decontaminated. 

Personnel and equipment need to be decontaminated in the CRZ. However, the CRZ might be a small area immediately adjacent to the remediation area, which workers are aware of, and is also marked appropriately. Although the CRZ is less formal and likely does not have many decontamination stations, efforts should be made to make sure that personnel and equipment are appropriately cleaned. Many times, due to the logistics of a smaller job, disposal of wastes becomes difficult. If purge water is drummed and left on the site, it is imperative that it is identified, labeled properly, recorded in the site log, and disposed of in the proper manner (in accordance with applicable, local, state, federal, or other regulations). 

We do not attempt to discuss in depth decontamination methods for radiological wastes. A health physicist should be immediately available to assist with decontamination of radioactively contaminated personnel or equipment. 

Testing for decontamination effectiveness, which might include analysis of the decontamination fluid along with visual inspections of personnel, equipment, and fluids... 

The contractor s SSAHP for Site C contained task- and operation-specific hazard analyses and safety and health procedures that covered general operations, but they were not specific enough for prescribing control methods and PPE for each job task. The plan identified some safety hazards for each operation but did not describe SOPs for protecting employees from these hazards. The SSAHP did, however, contain personnel and equipment decontamination procedures used at the site. 

The contractor s site control elements at Site B were not comprehensive however, the contractor s SSAHP did address site entry and training requirements and mandated that all personnel, including subcontractors and visitors entering the exclusion zone or decontamination zone, meet HAZWOPER training requirements. 

Site D lacked a sufficient CRZ and also lacked access/egress control for the exclusion zone. The site control plan did not accurately identify the function of the CRZ as a buffer zone between the exclusion zone and the support zone, and there was no buffer area between the decontamination pad and the road that runs adjacent to the pad, marked as a support zone. Also, an exclusion zone log-in procedure for tracking personnel who enter and exit this zone was not used on site as called for in the SSAHP. 

At Site I, personnel and equipment decontamination procedures were not monitored for their effectiveness in accordance with HAZ-WOPER requirements. The Site I subcontractor did not have provisions for particulate sampling, evaluating exposure to pesticides and herbicides, or evaluating the effectiveness of site zone boundaries and personnel decontamination procedures. Additionally, monitoring had not been conducted to verify that decontamination was not necessary for employees who leave the exclusion zone and enter a clean zone without undergoing decontamination. 

The SSAHP developed by the Site G contractor did not indicate that the contractors routinely conducted job- or task-specific hazard analyses. In addition, the SSAHP did not specify that PPE selection for jobs and tasks must be based on the analysis of the health hazards associated with each job. Eurthermore, the SSAHP contained no procedures for objectively determining the effectiveness of decontamination of personnel or equipment. The decontamination program required incineration of all materials that could not be readily decontaminated such materials were placed in labeled disposal containers. The program, however, did... 

Decontaminants. Area decontamination is not required as CS has a short duration, of effectiveness. Personnel exposed to CS may shower as necessary however, when CS dust or particles are on the skin, showering should be delayed for 6 hours to prevent stinging and reddening of the skin. Individuals affected by CS should move to fresh air, face the wind, and remain well spaced and should not rub their eyes. To remove accidental gross contamination, personnel should remove clothing and immediately flush body with copious amts of water to remove most of the agent apply 5% Na bisulfite soln to remove remainder (except in or around eyes) and then rinse body... 

TAetection of the highly potent impurity, 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD) in the herbicide 2,4,5-trichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4,5-T), necessitated an environmental assessment of the impact of this contaminate. Information was rapidly needed on movement, persistence, and plant uptake to determine whether low concentrations reaching plants, soils, and water posed any threat to man and his environment. Because of the extreme toxicity of TCDD, utmost precautions were taken to reduce or minimize the risk of exposure to laboratory personnel. Synthesis of uniformly labeled C-TCDD by Muelder and Shadoff (I) greatly facilitated TCDD detection in soil and plant experiments. For unlabeled experiments it seemed wise to use only small quantities of diluted solutions in situations where decontamination was feasible and to rely on the sensitivity afforded by electron capture gas chromatography... 

Source U.S. EPA, Field Standard Operating Procedures for Decontamination of Response Personnel, FSOP7, U.S. EPA, Washington, DC, 1985. 

Delineation of these three zones should be based on sampling and monitoring results and on an evaluation of the potential routes and amount of contaminant dispersion in the event of a release. Movement of personnel and equipment among these zones should be minimized and restricted to specific access control points to prevent cross-contamination from contaminated areas to clean areas. A decision for evaluating health and safety aspects of decontamination methods is presented in Figure 16.22.105... 

Stations should be separated physically to prevent cross-contamination and should be arranged in order of decreasing contamination, preferably in a straight line. Separate flow patterns and stations should be provided to isolate workers from different contamination zones containing incompatible wastes. Entry and exit points should be conspicuously marked, and the entry to the CRZ from the exclusion zone should be separate from the entry to the exclusion zone from the CRZ. Dressing stations for entry to the CRZ should be separate from redressing areas for exit from the CRZ. Personnel who wish to enter clean areas of the decontamination facility, such as locker rooms, should be completely decontaminated. 

Once the casualty has been decontaminated, including the removal of foreign matter from wounds, medical personnel do not need to wear a chemical-protective mask. 

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