Best Practices to Implement When Using a Fume Hood

A well-designed hood installed in a ventilated when used in the right way will be able to protect you from most of the exposures to hazardous laboratory chemicals. To use it in the right way, you need to have a trained and fully equipped laboratory worker. In the next part of the post, we are going to look at some of the most essential work practices that are always required when using fume hoods. Also, there are some highly stringent work practices that may be required in some circumstances; we are going to discuss that in the next part.

Good Work Practices to Implement
  • Conduct all the different types of work, and keep all devices and apparatus at a distance of at least 6 inches from the hood face’s back. You can make use of a stripe on the bench surface as a great reminder for the same. 

  •  As a good work practice, you need to keep the hood sash closed for most of the time when not in use.

  • You need to keep the hood slots and baffles away all all kinds of obstruction by containers. 

  • Never store any kind of chemicals or apparatus in the hood permanently. You should make use of large equipment inside the hood. These should be placed on the blocks to allow rapid airflow under the device or apparatus. In addition, you need to store different types of chemicals in safety cabinet that are pre-approved by the in-house experts.

  • Minimize all kinds of foot traffic from the face of the hood. You need to make sure that there are no fast movements when you getting things in and out of the chemical fume hood.

  • You must never remove hood sash or panels except when they are to set up any kind of apparatus or equipment. 

  • Last but not least, do not keep electrical receptacles (spark sources for example) inside the range of the fume hood. You should know that no electrical receptacles are ever permitted inside the hood.
Implement all these work practices when using ductless fume hood or any other type of fume hood for that matter.

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