Staff Services / Research Facilities / Education & Training – Research Facilities / Safety training

Training is an essential component of the Occupational Health and Safety Act, helping ensure that all workers can perform their jobs in a safe and healthy way. Research Facilities offers a variety of training courses to faculty, staff and student.

Courses are available in a number of formats including:

Online training

Research Facilities has developed e-learning modules for annual safety trainings and refresher trainings.

We also offer refresher modules for equipment available in the Core Facilities. The refresher courses will not be a substitution for initial training, but rather will help you understand and review methodologies you have previously learned. For Flow Cytometry, we will be developing additional modules to help you review compensation, hierarchical gating, multi-tube rack formats and data analysis techniques. We also hope to make available similar modules for other techniques and equipment in Research Core Facilities.

Each research stream will take the following courses:

COVID Safety Training

• Research Re-start Refresher

Biosafety Training

• Radiation Safety
• Health, Safety and WHMIS
• Fire Safety and Security
• Biosafety for Clinical Researchers
• Cryogenics training

*Please use Internet Explorer to access these modules

NEW Biosafety Modules for Wet Bench Researchers:

• Laboratory Safety
• Biosafety
• Chemical Safety 

Flow Cytometry

• MACS Quant Acquisition Refresher

 *Make sure you print screen the certificate/quiz results available at the end of the modules as proof you have completion of the training. This should then be stored in your group’s WHMIS binder. Please ensure that your name is on this document.

New employee training

All new staff and students working in research areas must undertake safety training.

Clerical

Workers are required to complete WHMIS training available through the St. Michael’s Learning Centre for employees of the hospital (those staff members who have an employee number) or in our online learning section below for non-St. Michael’s workers.

Wet bench in-class training

Workers are required to attend a half-day biosafety training course within the first three months of starting work. This includes WHMIS regulations, risk group classification, risk assessments and the requirements for containment level 1 and 2 labs, basic laboratory biosafety, emergency spill procedures and infection control practices. Please check our upcoming events for the next training session.

Clinical

Researcher co-ordinators II and III, that will be handling human specimens or undertake lab work are required to attend a biosafety course designed to address clinical needs. Please contact the biosafety officer for more information.

Hands-on training

Training sessions on blood borne pathogen, spill response and liquid handling are offered to all researchers.

Biohazardous and chemical liquid handling course

The purpose of the course is to:

1. Demonstrate appropriate techniques for cleaning-up minor chemical and biological spills, including incident notification procedure
2. Allow researchers to get hands-on experience using our multi-purpose spill kits
3. Provide an overview of blood borne pathogens, including a review of safe transport

Please check our upcoming events for the next training session.

Transport of dangerous goods

Staff involved in the shipping and receiving of hazardous goods are required to undergo Transport of Dangerous Goods (TDG) training and hold a valid certificate. Certificates are valid for three years under TDG regulations and two years under International Air Transport Association regulations.

Research Staff at St. Michael’s Hospital can obtain TDG training through an external training provider, Saf-T-Pak. Please contact the research biosafety officer who can provide you with instructions on how to access this training.

Cryogenic training

All staff wishing to handle cryogenic materials (liquid Nitrogen, “dry ice” CO2) must complete an online cryogenic handling course (please see online modules) and attend a hands-on demonstration with the biological safety officer. Access to the cryogenic dispensing area on the loading dock will only be given to those members of staff who have received training.