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PPE: WEARABLE TECHNOLOGY
How Connectivity is Leading the Future of PPE
Advanced technologies are creating safer, more efficient work environments.
WBY CHRIS BORNEO
ant to know what makes one safety program more proactive than another? It’s simple: having access to meaningful data—which data is collected, how it’s collected, how it’s disseminated, who analyzes it and
when can determine how proactive your safety program is. That’s because every single data point has the power to inform decisions that can change your workplace safety and, perhaps, save a life.
What Is Meaningful Data?
Meaningful data is information that is relevant to a given situation. It’s information that helps in identifying risks, as well as mitigating them. More importantly, it’s information that promotes employee well-being and worker safety. Organizations that understand the importance of it know that meaningful data is accessible, accurate, automatic, applicable and actionable.
Where Does Meaningful Data Come From?
If you think about it, critical data points come from—and have an impact on—three primary sources: workers, worksites and workflows.
Data points for workers include things such as PPE compliance, productivity and incidents. Worksite data points provide information about the jobsite, including location, working conditions and potential hazards. Workflow data points include PPE readiness, device assignment and management and reporting and recordkeeping.
In the world of safer gas detection, these data points, if they’re meaningful, will translate answers to such fundamental questions as these:
■ At the start of the workday, is the PPE ready to use?
■ At the end of the workday, did the worker use the assigned device for the entire shift?
■ Throughout the workday, what, if anything, happened that needs to be explored, investigated, mitigated or resolved?
Traditional PPE offers limited awareness and little in the way of answers to those questions. Also, traditional PPE is fraught with the potential for human error, often making even the most basic compliance a challenge.
A connected safety program, on the other hand, reliably and accurately answers those questions and helps safety managers create a more transformational, proactive safety culture.
Connectivity: Why It’s Important
Like other technological innovations, connectivity is a capability that facilitates transparency, drives commitment to a common cause and enables people to learn what they otherwise might not.
Safety programs deserve to have this capability. Think about it. Millions of workplace injuries, the costs associated with them and untold productivity losses happen every year simply because organizations don’t have the ability to incorporate technology- based solutions that can help prevent these issues.
What’s surprising is that we live in a world where our phones
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can start a car while we stay warm inside our comfy house, change the temperature on our thermostat while we’re away or ensure that a loved one arrives at their intended destination, yet we haven’t been able to apply these same technologies to the world of safety.
There’s been a reported 2.8 million workplace injuries and illness as recently as 20191, and an estimated 80 to 90 percent of those attributed to human error—all because safety technology was left in the dark.2 That is, until now.
Advanced technologies are proving their capacity for reducing the potential for human error, which may explain why industries, such as oil & gas, chemical production and construction are expected to lead the way in terms of adopting connected worker technologies within the next two decades.3
This is good news for safety-focused organizations. Why? Because connectivity will connect workers, worksites and workflows so that safety managers can anticipate need, safeguard personnel and respond to situations more quickly and confidently than ever before.
What is Connected PPE?
While traditional PPE protects the wearer, it does not have the ability to enable real-time visibility across workers and worksites; nor can it provide data that leads to insights and trends that can be used to influence worker behavior. Additionally, as demands on workers and safety managers escalate, conventional methods and processes for recordkeeping and maintenance have demonstrated how prone they are to human errors, ranging from inconsistencies to incompletions to inaccuracies.
Successful integration of a connected work solution means that workers, worksites, and workflows are seamlessly connected. What that looks like is a complete system comprised of:
Hardware. Smart devices that can perform out-of-the-box with cellular connectivity to the cloud and with the durability and functionality required to protect the worker.
Software. Solutions that support remote monitoring, reporting, and enhanced site safety.
Cloud. Equipment status, asset information, data logs, and centralized reports all in one place.
This model of worker-worksite-workflow connectivity is what can transform traditional PPE devices into a data-driven, future- forward solution.
The Connected Work Model
Here’s a closer look at the worker-worksite-workflow model and how integrating connectivity into your safety program can help your organization become more proactive.
Connected Workers. Enhanced awareness and visibility can help reduce safety risks by answering key questions, such as: What’s happening? Where is it happening? Is what’s going on a true emergency or a false alarm?
While traditional PPE is good for protecting the wearer,