[Histonet] Manual Coverslipping Safety Issues

[Amos Brooks]

Hi Eric,
	I used it as an additional reason in addition to cost control. The safety 
reasons are irrefutable, but you can't really put a price tag on it until you 
threaten to sue for a specific monitary amount or have OSHA threaten them with 
a specific fine. Business offices don't speak safety. You should add the 
safety concerns to an actual cost to savings ratio. If you time how long it 
takes you to coverslip a specific number of slides, you can determine how many 
slides you would cover in an hour. Taking the average salary per hour in your 
lab you would then determine how much you are spending in tech time in the lab 
per year. Comparing this to the cost of the equipment then you could determine 
how long it would take to recover the cost and have the machine pay for 
itself. Heartless pencil pushers just don't comprehend chemical hazards. It 
has to be a price game.

Amos
the jaded


On Tuesday 04 January 2011 12:40:49 pm histonet-
request <@t> lists.utsouthwestern.edu wrote:
> Message: 23
> Date: Tue, 4 Jan 2011 12:24:21 -0500
> From: "Gagnon, Eric" <gagnone <@t> KGH.KARI.NET>
> Subject: [Histonet] Manual Coverslipping Safety Issues
> To: <histonet <@t> lists.utsouthwestern.edu>
> Message-ID:
> 
        <F93BD6329FC3AE4C8DB116B985FBC31327C3AD43 <@t> KGHMAIL.KGH.ON.CA>
> Content-Type: text/plain;       charset="iso-8859-1"
>
> Has anyone successfully lobbied their institution for an automated
> coverslipper for safety reasons? 
> Still coverslipping manually-stained IHC, neuro autopsy and special stains,
> sometimes hundreds per day. There has to be a better way.  Under budget
> constraints. That's why I'm wondering if anyone has used concerns about
> histology staff safety, specifically techs under direct exposure to
> toluene/xylene, to enable purchase of an automated/robot coverslipper. 
> I'd be interested in anyone's experience with this approach, successfully
> or unsuccessfully. 
> Eric Gagnon MLT
> Histology Laboratory
> Kingston General Hospital
> Kingston, Ontario, Canada