Personal protective equipment
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Personal protective equipment (PPE) is protective clothing, helmets, goggles, or other garments or equipment designed to protect the wearer's body from injury or infection. The hazards addressed by protective equipment include physical, electrical, heat, chemicals, biohazards, and airborne particulate matter. Protective equipment may be worn for job-related occupational safety and health purposes, as well as for sports and other recreational activities. "Protective clothing" is applied to traditional categories of clothing, and "protective gear" applies to items such as pads, guards, shields, or masks, and others.
The purpose of personal protective equipment is to reduce employee exposure to hazards when engineering controls and administrative controls are not feasible or effective to reduce these risks to acceptable levels. PPE is needed when there are hazards present. PPE has the serious limitation that it does not eliminate the hazard at the source and may result in employees being exposed to the hazard if the equipment fails.
See also
- Biological hazard
- Blunt trauma personal protective equipment
- Bomb disposal
- CBRN (Chemical Biological Radiological Nuclear, known formerly as NBC)
- Chainsaw safety clothing
- Chemical protective clothing
- Environmental suit
- Fall arrest
- Hard hat
- Hazmat (hazardous materials)
- High-visibility clothing
- Motorcycle personal protective equipment
- NBC suit
- Personal flotation device
- Personal protective equipment for arc flash
- Safe handling of hazardous drugs
- Safety harness
- Usage of personal protective equipment