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Industrial Hygiene
Program Management Guide

Ever wish your IH program had a more cohesive, process-based structure? Looking for an easier,
more efficient way to coordinate and manage all of the complex data, sampling, reporting and
other tasks necessary to maintain compliance and protect worker health? Whether you’re a
seasoned CIH or new to the field of IH, this guide will walk you through the IH Program Cycle
to introduce strategies for how to strengthen your program while applying continuous
improvement principles to drive long-term IH program performance.

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The IH Program Management Cycle

STEP 1: Identify Similar Exposure Groups STEP 3: Sampling Plan
(SEGs) Your sample plan is the playbook for how, when,
SEGs are the foundation for any successful where and what you will sample. Rightly so, it should
IH program. Monitoring and assessing each be kept up-to-date to ensure you’re meeting your
worker’s individual exposure risk to potentially multiple sampling requirements and addressing the changing exposure
workplace stressors (noise, chemicals, etc.) is simply not risks in your workplace. Simply relying on past sampling plans
practical. If nothing else, it would consume an extraordinary to determine future sampling activity may leave you out of
amount of your time and resources. compliance and, worse yet, put workers’ health at risk.

SEGs allow you to group workers with similar exposure risks If your qualitative exposure assessments were performed
based on job tasks, roles, locations and other exposure risk properly, the jobs, tasks and stressors that require sampling
variables. For example, all workers who perform the same should be apparent. However, a common stumbling block is
job function at the same location under essentially identical determining how frequently to sample. Sampling is expensive
conditions can be expected to have similar exposure risks, and time consuming to begin with, and collecting unnecessary
and can therefore be grouped into a SEG. If we assess the samples puts a strain on your already limited resources.
exposure levels of a few of them, we can be statistically
confident that other workers under the same conditions Not only that, but having a clear plan that is easy to explain to
have the same exposure risk. management will help better communicate the value of IH to
management and other stakeholders, and gain their support
SEGs help consolidate your sampling activities and minimize in terms of budgeting and engagement for your IH program.
the total number of samples you ultimately need to collect.
SEGs also help us standardize our subsequent IH program STEP 4: Sampling & Working with your
activities including qualitative exposure assessments (QEAs), Laboratories
sampling plans, medical surveillance and exposure controls.
Your IH analytical lab is a valuable resource that you
want to make sure you’re taking full advantage of.
STEP 2: Qualitative Exposure Assessments It’s important to communicate with your lab and get organized
(QEAs) before beginning any of your IH surveys. This will help reduce
Once you’ve identified your SEGs, you can then your effort and improve your sample collection, resulting in
begin your qualitative exposure assessments better data with less effort and time.
(QEAs). QEAs are essentially an estimate of a SEG’s exposure
risk based on observations of working conditions and Improved communication with your IH lab can also help
your best professional judgement. For some SEGs, you streamline analysis and decrease sample turnaround times.
may have historic exposure data available to help estimate It can also simplify access to your lab’s sample analysis guides
and even quantify exposure risks, while others will have (SAGs) to ensure proper sampling protocols, helping to reduce
no data available and require you to assess their risk via data errors and maximize your sample collection efforts. It’s
other methods. even possible to integrate your IH database with your lab’s
LIMS to allow for direct upload of analytical results, unlocking
A risk matrix should be a familiar concept to many EHS new levels of sampling efficiency and accuracy.
professionals as it is already applied in many other areas
of EHS management. This familiar format helps clearly
and easily communicate exposure risks to management
and non-technical audiences, and promotes a broad
understanding of exposure risks across the organization.

VelocityEHS — Reach Your EHS Goals Faster.

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STEP 5: Data Analysis & Effective STEP 7: Evaluating & Communicating

Communication Performance
IH data analysis can be intimidating for some, but The final step in the IH Program Management
protecting workers and improving IH program Cycle is perhaps the most important. Applying
performance absolutely depends on your ability to evaluate continuous improvement principles to your IH program is key
and interpret complex IH data. Improved visibility and to achieving greater efficiency and performance. Leverage
communication of your IH data and analytics gives you the your IH data and analysis to adjust your SEGs, qualitative
ability to more quickly and accurately address exposure risks, exposure assessments and sampling plans with the goal of
and implement more effective exposure controls. improving their precision and efficiency. For example, reviewing
your SEGs, QEAs and sampling plan can help you minimize
The purists out there will say that IH data analysis requires the number of samples you need to collect over time. Failing
highly specialized tools, or a deep understanding of statistics. to learn from and act on your IH data not only inhibits IH
It can also simplify access to your lab’s sample analysis guides program efficiencies, but limits your program’s ability to adapt
(SAGs) to help ensure use of proper sampling protocols, to changing workplace stressors and exposure risks.
reduce data errors and maximize your sample collection
efforts. There’s a variety of methods to analyze IH sample data Communication is also vital to the continuous improvement
that are quick and easy to implement that can help you cut of your IH program. Being able to justify the value of your
through the ‘noise’ and deliver more valuable insights that IH program investment to management, secure budget for
drive greater IH program performance. exposure controls and other program improvements, and
gaining broad support for your program among stakeholders
STEP 6: Medical Surveillance all depend on clearly communicating program performance.
One of the most important decisions IH
professionals need to make is determining who Putting it All Together
needs to be enrolled in medical surveillance
programs. Not only to maintain compliance with workplace From SEGs, QEAs and sampling activities to data analysis,
exposure standards, but more importantly, to safeguard the medical surveillance and reporting – an IH program has a lot
health of your workers. Workplace exposure regulations differ of moving parts. Unfortunately, coordinating each of these
significantly around the world, but fortunately, their medical individual elements into a cohesive, process-based IH program
surveillance provisions are largely similar. is a goal that continues to elude even the most experienced
IH professionals. That’s because many are still relying on
It’s important to establish your medical surveillance programs an outdated patchwork of software apps and paper-based
in a way that minimizes your testing requirements by systems that don’t work easily together, and were never
ensuring only workers who require medical surveillance designed to manage IH to begin with.
are enrolled. This will ultimately help reduce program costs
and simplify compliance. One strategy to achieve this is to
manage medical surveillance requirements at the SEG-level,
rather than focusing on individual worker enrollments. When VelocityEHS IH Solutions offer CIHs and non-IH
your sampling data indicates a change in exposure level and professionals alike, a purpose-built IH software
relevant medical surveillance requirements, you’ll be able platform to manage and coordinate every aspect of
to more quickly respond by enrolling or de-enrolling every your IH program. Designed by our in-house team of
worker in the SEG. Certified Industrial Hygienists (CIHs), VelocityEHS
IH Solutions help you easily assess and control
You also want to make sure your surveillance programs remain workplace stressors, automate time-consuming
flexible enough so you can readily identify new or changing IH tasks and maintain a world-class IH program, no
workplace stressors and corresponding medical surveillance matter what your level of IH expertise. You’ll be able
requirements, and quickly update your enrollments and to dramatically reduce the time and effort required to
medical screenings based on changing exposure levels and maintain compliance, implement a more integrated
applicable OELs. approach to IH management, and drive continuous
improvement of your IH program performance.

VelocityEHS — Reach Your EHS Goals Faster.

© 2001-2021 VelocityEHS. All rights reserved. VelocityEHS®, MSDSonline®, Humantech® and ChemTel®
are proprietary trademarks of [Link] other trademarks are the property of the respective owners.