Hey, Peggy, you go, girl!!  I completely aggree with you.  I have more
opinions about this, but they are very inflammatory (talk about flammable!!
*g*), so I'll hold my tongue (fingers?) for now.

COnnie McManus


At 04:55 AM 7/27/01 -0400, Lee & Peggy Wenk wrote:
>Never heard of this!!!! At to MY opinion . . . .
>
>It ranks up there with a call I received about another lab. The fire marshal
>had just walked through their lab, saw the tissue processor, asked
>what the solutions were on the machine, looked up in his little book
>alcohol and xylene, saw that they were flammable, and declared
>that the lab would no longer be allowed to use the tissue processor
>ever again, as it had electricity with flammable solutions!
>
>A microscope, even with a slide on it, is not corrosive, toxic,
>biohazardous,
>radioactive, flammable, ignitable, an oxidizer, reactive, explosive,
>carcinogenic,
>mutagenic, or any other hazard of which one can think.
>
>The only hazard is carpal tunnel syndrome, if improperly set up
>and used, and that can occur anywhere.
>
>Plus migraines, ulcers, short tempers, and rudeness from pathologists
>not being allowed to use a microscope in their office.
>
>As for non-carpeting - well, if you have ever dropped a slide, or worse,
>a tray of slides, on the floor, non-carpet areas yield more broken slides
>than carpet. So the chances of cutting your fingers on broken glass
>are greatly increased on non-carpet areas. Not mentioning ruining the
>patients' slides and increasing the work for the histotech who has
>to re-cut the block of tissue and stain new slides, thus exposing the
>histotech to more chances of them cutting their fingers or being exposed
>to more chemicals.
>
>Fight this one, Tim, for the sake of sanity and reality in the work place!
>
>Good luck!
>
>Peggy A. Wenk, HTL(ASCP)
>William Beaumont Hospital
>Royal Oak, MI 48073
>
>
>
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Morken, Tim" 
>To: "'Histonet'" 
>Sent: Thursday, July 26, 2001 4:32 PM
>Subject: Microscopes in offices?
>
>
>> We are designing a new lab building. One of the "standards" that the
>Office
>> of Health and Safety has dreamed up is that there is to be no "lab
>> equipment" in offices. The office area will be completely separated from
>the
>> lab area. They include in this mandate a requirement that offices cannot
>> have microscopes in them. Of course our pathologists are a bit miffed at
>> this requirement! All pathologists and technologists will have their own
>> offices in the office area. I was wondering if anyone on Histonet works
>with
>> a pathologist who is not allowed have a microscope in his/her office. Are
>> any pathologists offices with microscopes, or multihead microscope rooms,
>> required to have non-carpeted floors?
>>
>> Tim Morken
>> C