Why We Inspect
The Biosafety Office conducts safety inspections for all laboratories on an annual basis. These inspections are based on requirements from state and federal authorities, regulatory bodies such as the NIH rDNA Guidelines, industry standards such as the CDC/NIH Biosafety in Microbiological and Biomedical Laboratories (BMBL), and local University rules and regulations as outlined in the Laboratory Safety Manual and the Biosafety Manual. Inspection results can both provide immediate assistance in life & death hazards as well as help provide guidance to labs on target priorities for internal safety culture development.
Planning For Inspection
EHS plans inspections based on the building the lab resides. When EHS visits your building, you will be notified at least 2 weeks prior to prepare for the inspection and to coordinate your lab’s inspection. It is preferable that a representative of the lab be present to show us around, to explain the research, and to ask us questions.
After the Inspection
After inspection, EHS will send the inspection report to the Principal Investigator and lab manager within 2 weeks. The lab must correct all audit findings from the report within 2 weeks, unless otherwise specified, submitting pictures or other documentation to demonstrate corrections. EHS reserves the right to conduct un-announced follow-up inspections to verify laboratory has instituted respective corrections. Once all inspections findings have been corrected, EHS will close the annual inspection documenting that the lab has complied with all University of Miami laboratory safety standards.
Preparing for Inspection
To help you prepare for our visit, we’ve created documents to help bring transparency to our process. The Checklist is updated and uploaded annually to provide you with a list of the items we'll be looking for this year. The Cheat Sheet is a quick reference that goes through each item on the checklist and outlines why an item is a safety concern, how to get in compliance if you're unsure, and provides the reference or citation for that item.
Chemical Inventory
During our inspection we also verify the lab’s Chemical Inventory and check whether any of those items would need to be registered as a Chemicals of Interest (COI). Labs must use the EHS provided chemical inventory template.
