Personal protective equipment (PPE) is the last line of protection for employees, after all feasible efforts are made to substitute or eliminate the known hazard at the source (engineering controls) and after safe procedures and rotation of employees (administrative controls) have been evaluated. PPE is used when there is a known hazard that cannot be removed or further reduced to a level of no concern and exists in a work area or assigned task to protect employees from the known hazard.
A reminder to all that there is no single type of PPE that can protect all individuals or protect one person from all known hazards. Therefore, the employer and employees must know what the hazard is that requires employee protection, what type of PPE is needed for that protection, what that specific PPE’s limitations are regarding providing that protection, and trained in its proper use, cleaning, and storage.