The Engineering Toolbox Next, imagine the HHD in your pocket, which already contains sensors for detecting light, temperature, pressure, magnetic fields, acceleration, and orientation, has a free app that converts those sensors’ output into numerical SI units representing these measurands…et voila, you have the beginnings of a compact “engineering toolbox” that can greatly enhance your ability to measure and react to changes in your environment in real time. Many apps use the sensors already in your phone to detect potential hazards. Let’s take this a step further and add some low-cost hardware that either plugs directly into your HHD or interfaces using Bluetooth, like a precision microphone, a gas sensor, or even a radiation monitor (“Geiger Counter”). Through these tools, industrial hygienists of the (very near) future will benefit from developments that all started with a simple concept: a miniaturized computer that fits in your pocket and just happens to make phone calls! When you view your smartphone or tablet as a central hub for acquiring, accessing, and sharing information and data in real time, its vast potential for industrial hygiene becomes apparent. The universe of applications, accessories, and appurtenances that relate to our profession is rapidly expanding, and adoption of these technologies is just beginning. However, using handhelds to assess risk and measure exposure to workplace hazards raises many concerns. One is the need to balance the desire for acquiring far greater numbers of exposure samples at low cost with the accuracy required for any one sample to be meaningful, let alone consistent with measurement standards including traceable field calibration and with acceptable limits of uncertainty for regulatory compliance purposes. Most, if not all, of the low-cost sensors currently offered to interface with HHDs for real-time measurements are just okay at detecting the targeted agents of concern, and they do not meet ANSI, IEC, or other relevant standards for accuracy in determining exposure risks relative to published Threshold Limit Values (TLVs), Permissible Exposure Limits (PELs), and other occupational exposure limits. While these sensors may rapidly improve as demand and investment leap forward, smartphones are currently poor substitutes for standards-compliant quantitative measuring instruments. That said, these devices make excellent screening tools and provide an on-the-spot capability for responding to worker concerns about agents such as noise, vibration, and lighting levels. For maximum effectiveness and credibility when using these apps, you can find published studies of their relative accuracy by various researchers, including NIOSH staff. This concern doesn’t automatically preclude the use of HHDs in industrial hygiene applications where the exposure measurements have to be made with instruments meeting the required standards. More manufacturers are adding wireless real-time communication capability to their instruments, which allows the practitioner to monitor and record exposure levels on multiple workers simultaneously. Practitioners can also control the monitoring devices to start and stop a sample without interrupting the worker. Given the capability to capture data wirelessly from instruments, along with other features such as the camera, the HHD becomes a convenient platform for acquiring, aggregating, enhancing, and sharing exposure data, much the way we currently share photos of that great meal we just sat down to at the latest bistro.

From Tablet to TLV and Back Again The Impact of Consumer-driven Technology Development on Real-time Exposure Assessment By Rob Brauch