OHSI 27th Annual Conference
"Occupational Hygiene – playing its part"
Wednesday 6th and Thursday 7th March 2019

OCCUPATIONAL HYGIENE (OH) CHALLENGES – PLAYING STRATEGICALLY

Workshop Facilitator: Dr Bob Rajan– Health and Safety Executive, UK
Duration 2:00-6:00pm
Wednesday 6th March 2019

In this workshop, we explore OH challenges and opportunities under three themes and propose strategic approaches for preventing work-related ill-health.

The themes are:

• Reporting key risk management information
• Promoting positive culture, attitudes and behaviours (CAB) for better exposure control outcomes
• Maximising new developments in OH practice

We will explore the said themes with the help of the following approaches.

• Developing and implementing Ill-health Prevention and Performance Indicators (IPPI)
• Influencing CAB with Learning Occupational Health by Experiencing Risks (LOcHER) and Virtual Reality (VR)
• Applying Artificial Intelligence (AI), digital technology and failure minimisation exposure control approaches.

This conference contributes CPD points tow ards BOHS, IOSH and AIHA

CONFERENCE DINNER

6th March 2019 8.00 pm
CLAYTON HOTEL SILVER SPRINGS, CORK

CONFERENCE PROGRAMME 7th MARCH

08.30	Registration
09.00	Conference Opening Dr Eoin Collins OHSI Hon. President and Dr. Sharon Guinness, HSA Chief Executive
09.10	Annual Tom O' Connor Lecture: 'Estimating burden of disease: the contribution of occupation' Dr. Lesley Rushton Estimation of the burden of occupational disease due to different causes makes an important contribution to the identification of key risk factors and the development of risk reduction strategies together with formulation of health policy. This presentation will briefly outline the methods used and highlight methodological issues and data limitations.
09.50	'Chemicals, Carcinogens and Construction – the changing landscape' Michelle McDermott, HSA Michelle will speak about the ongoing updates to the Carcinogens Directive, the updated Code of Practice for Chemical Agents, and increasing focus on Health, especially in Construction. The presentation will link with the Dangerous Substances Campaign and Roadmap on Carcinogens and provide information on resources available
10.35	Tea/Coffee Break
11.00	'Statistics for Occupational Hygienists – Testing Compliance with Exposure Limits' Kelvin Williams This is a presentation on the use of statistics to help you make defensible decisions about compliance or noncompliance with exposure limits. It introduces the strategy jointly developed by the British and Dutch occupational hygiene societies and adopted in NEN-EN 689 "Workplace exposure - Measurement of exposure by inhalation to chemical agents - Strategy for testing compliance with occupational exposure limit values" (May 2018).
11.40	'Occupational Hygiene Challenges and Opportunities – Playing Strategically' Dr. Bob Rajan Bob will explore three themes and propose a limited number of strategic approaches for preventing work-related ill-health. The themes explored, include reporting key risk management information; Promoting positive culture, attitudes and behaviours for better exposure control outcomes and maximising new developments in OH practices.
12.20	Exhibitor Presentations Meet the exhibitors.
13.00	LUNCH & EXHIBITS
14.15	OHSI AGM
14.30	'Human Biomonitoring sampling methods for evaluating occupational exposures' Alison Connolly Human Biomonitoring is an exposure assessment technique used to assess a person's specific exposure to a hazard in both an environmental and occupational setting, by measuring substances in body fluids such as blood, urine, and breast milk. Case studies using human biomonitoring to assess exposures in the workforce will be presented.
15.10	Legislative updates on REACH and CLP. Caroline Walsh, HSA Including how the information from REACH registrations can improve chemical safety at work, hot topics including the potential impact of Brexit on the chemical supply chain, an overview of amendments to REACH and CLP, related guidance and helpdesk supports.
15.50	'Management of Respirable Crystalline Silica (RCS) in Construction' John Egan To outline the approach taken by the construction sector for the management of RCS mindful of the respective OELV of 0.1mg/m3 (8 hour reference period), as set down in the 2018 Code of Practice for the Chemical Agents Regulations published by the Health & Safety Authority.
16.30	Conference Close. Anne Moore OHSI Hon. President

SPEAKERS

DR. BOB RAJAN: Bob is passionate about exposure control design and has been involved in instrumentation design, development of models and codes for mistake-proof exposure control design.He is a Principal Inspector with HSE and involved in the development of strategies and policies associated with substances hazardous to health. At present he is concentrating on developing and applying leading indicators and the LOcHER project, which is helping to engage and empower young learners so that they can take measures to protect their health when entering the world of work. He is a Vice Chair of SGUK and past president of BOHS.

DR. LESLEY RUSHTON: Lesley Rushton is an epidemiologist/statistician with extensive research experience into occupational and environmental causes of ill health, including studies of workers in several industries such as the oil industry, silica sand and printing industries, children's health and air pollution, estimation of burden of occupationally- related cancer in Britain, design and application of an occupational module for UK Biobank. She is member of the UK Committee on Carcinogenicity and the UK HSE Engineering and Environmental Assurance Committee and is Chair of the UK Industrial Injuries Advisory Council.

MICHELLE MCDERMOTT: Michelle McDermott, MSc., LFOH, has worked as an inspector within the Occupational Hygiene Unit of the HSA since 2008. In addition to workplace inspections and investigations, she is a member of the REACH Substance Evaluation Team. Prior to her role in the HSA, she worked in health and safety roles in the manufacturing industry.

CAROLINE WALSH: Caroline works in the Chemicals and Prevention Division where she manages the HSA's Chemicals Helpdesk and represents Ireland at the ECHA HelpNet Steering group. She leads on CLP policy and her work includes legislative updates to CLP, reviewing ECHA guidance and updating FAQs. She provides technical support to her compliance Colleagues, Government Departments and Agencies involved in the REACH and CLP processes at home and abroad.

KELVIN WILLIAMS: Kelvin Williams is an independent occupational hygiene consultant with over 30 years of experience providing a wide range of occupational hygiene services to clients in the public and private sectors. Kelvin's experience includes roles as Head of Environmental Health and Safety at Stanger Consultants, Chief Occupational Hygienist at Wimtec Environmental and Operations Director for the Occupational Health and Environment Divisions at National Britannia Ltd.

DR. ALISON CONNOLLY: Alison is an exposure scientist and a recent doctoral graduate, who is currently conducting postdoctoral research at NUI Galway. Alison's PhD research project involved investigating occupational pesticide exposures among amenity horticulturists. Alison has a keen interest in exposure science and occupational hygiene and is a member of the British Occupational Hygiene Society (BOHS), a committee member of the Occupational Hygiene Society of Ireland (OHSI) and a member of the International Society of Exposure Science (ISES) .

JOHN EGAN: John is an Executive for Safety and Training with the Construction Industry Federation (CIF). One of John's key objectives is to develop health and safety initiatives for the construction sector. This includes participation on working groups for the CIF and for the Construction Safety Partnership Advisory Committee (CSPAC). John partakes in social dialogue meetings on dust management with the European Construction Industry Federation (FIEC) and the European Federation of Building and Woodworkers (EFBWW).

Conference Downloads

Presentation materials and resources from previous conferences are available for download below:

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Previous Conferences

2017 - Made to Measure

2016 - Who's in Control?

2015 - Risky Business

2014 - How Well do we Communicate?

2013 - Ill Health Prevention

2012 - Navigating Current and Future Challenges

2011 - Hygiene in the Stand

2010 - To Measure or not to Measure

2009 - Breathe Easy

2008 - REACHing for Control

2007 - Physical Agents and Industrial Hygiene

2006 - Detecting the Invisible

2005 - Other Life Forms at Our Place of Work