National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, National Personal Protective Technology Laboratory, Pittsburgh, PA 15236, USA.
J Occup Environ Hyg. 2013;10(9):496-504. doi: 10.1080/15459624.2013.818237.
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)-certified N95 filtering facepiece respirators (FFRs) are used for respiratory protection in some workplaces handling engineered nanomaterials. Previous NIOSH research has focused on filtration performance against nanoparticles. This article is the first NIOSH study using human test subjects to compare N95 FFR faceseal leakage (FSL) performance against nanoparticles and "all size" particles. In this study, estimates of FSL were obtained from fit factor (FF) measurements from nine test subjects who participated in previous fit-test studies. These data were analyzed to compare values obtained by: 1) using the PortaCount Plus (8020A, TSI, Inc., MN, USA) alone (measureable particle size range 20 nm to > 1,000 nm, hereby referred to as the "all size particles test"), and 2) using the PortaCount Plus with N95-Companion(TM) accessory (8095, TSI, Inc., Minn.) accessory (negatively charged particles, size range ∼40 to 60 nm, hereby referred to as the "nanoparticles test"). Log-transformed FF values were compared for the "all size particles test" and "nanoparticles test" using one-way analysis of variance tests (significant at P < 0.05). For individual FFR models, geometric mean (GM) FF using the "nanoparticles test" was the same or higher than the GM FFs using "all size particles test." For all three FFR models combined, GM FF using the "nanoparticles test" was significantly higher than the GM FF using "all size particles test" (P < 0.05). These data suggest that FSL for negatively charged ∼40-60 nm nanoparticles is not greater than the FSL for the larger distribution of charged and uncharged 20 to > 1,000 nm particles.
美国职业安全与健康研究所（NIOSH）认证的 N95 过滤式面罩（FFR）用于一些处理工程纳米材料的工作场所的呼吸保护。以前的 NIOSH 研究主要集中在纳米颗粒的过滤性能上。本文是 NIOSH 首次使用人体测试对象进行的研究，比较了 N95 FFR 面部密封泄漏（FSL）性能对纳米颗粒和“所有尺寸”颗粒的影响。在这项研究中，从以前参加过拟合测试研究的九名测试对象的拟合因子（FF）测量中获得了 FSL 的估计值。对这些数据进行了分析，以比较通过以下两种方法获得的值：1）仅使用 PortaCount Plus（8020A，TSI，Inc.，MN，USA）（可测量的粒径范围为 20nm 至> 1000nm，以下简称“所有尺寸颗粒测试”），和 2）使用 PortaCount Plus 与 N95-Companion（TM）附件（8095，TSI，Inc.，Minn.）附件（带负电荷的颗粒，尺寸范围约为 40 至 60nm，以下简称“纳米颗粒测试”）。使用单向方差分析检验（P<0.05 时具有统计学意义）对“所有尺寸颗粒测试”和“纳米颗粒测试”的对数转换后的 FF 值进行了比较。对于各个 FFR 模型，使用“纳米颗粒测试”的几何平均值（GM）FF 与使用“所有尺寸颗粒测试”的 GM FF 相同或更高。对于三种 FFR 模型的总和，使用“纳米颗粒测试”的 GM FF 明显高于使用“所有尺寸颗粒测试”的 GM FF（P<0.05）。这些数据表明，对于带负电荷的约 40-60nm 纳米颗粒，FSL 并不大于带电荷和不带电荷的较大分布的 20-1000nm 颗粒的 FSL。
