The new technology has brought many benefits. How can we, as health and safety personnel embrace the benefits that technology has provided us with?
Innovating Health and Safety
Like most industries, environmental health and safety has embraced the positive effect of the push towards technology and the advancements of monitoring is a huge part of this. Occupational hygienists, noise consultants and engineers are some of the personnel using the new technology in their everyday roles, monitoring dust and noise levels for individual workers and in the wider environment.
Monitoring for Noise, dust and vibration still requires an equal amount of human intuition in order to assess the vital aspects including the likely causes, people impacting and the steps to improve the environment.
When monitoring is taking place, you should always take in to account all the other factors on the day. For example, windows being open during summer causing a breeze which could distribute dust particles within the area being tested. If this same test was to be conducted during winter with the windows closed, the dust would remain on surfaces making it more apparent. This seasonal change can cause an issue to go unnoticed. To ensure an accurate and successful test is to combine human intuition, experience and technology.
The Happy Medium
Technology is forever changing and making our lives easier by providing us with useful applications including, portable GPS, Bluetooth and other useful applications, however it can also take users away from reality.
It is clear that despite the growth in technology, it has undoubtable benefits. The use of technology is an extension of our own capabilities, not a replacement. You need to utilise both human intuition and technology to be able to monitor an environment correctly.
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