When choosing new safety gloves, the first thing that comes to mind is how they fit. Although we think about this most often in terms of if they’re a good fit on our hands, you also need to know whether they will work for the situation in which you will be using them. Although all safety gloves are designed to protect the wearer’s hands from injury, not all of them can protect them from all types of hazards. In fact, even though wearing safety gloves could have prevented the majority of hand injuries in the workplace, practically all other hand injuries were caused by workers not wearing the right type of gloves for the job. In those situations, wearing the wrong style was just as bad as not wearing any at all. That means workers not only need to remember to wear safety gloves in hazardous situations, but they also need to be aware of which types are best suited for their application.

Not All Safety Gloves Are Created Equal

Although all safety gloves are designed to protect workers’ hands, not all are created equal. For example, some gloves protect workers’ hands from cuts or punctures from sharp objects, but they will not protect them against burns from caustic substances such as acid. Other gloves serve to protect against caustic substances but cannot keep workers’ hands safe in extreme cold temperatures. Gloves that are insulated against extreme cold may not provide the manual dexterity workers may need to perform delicate or detailed tasks, but other types of safety gloves are thin and skin-tight to provide the fullest range of motion. When it comes to being prepared for a hazardous situation, knowing which gloves suit the situation is as important as remembering to wear them in the first place.

Understanding that gloves need to fit both the situation and the wearer is essential for providing workers with the best possible protection against hazardous situations in the workplace. Even if a worker is wearing them, if he or she has selected the wrong type for the task at hand, the risk of injury may still be just as high — if not higher. Those injuries can be disastrous for the worker as well as his or her employer. Our friends at Enviro Tech have put together the chart below which provides information about the most common types of safety gloves and their intended usage. Consult it, and you’ll be more confident that your safety gloves fit the hazard as well as your hands.

Safety Glove Chart

Guide To Choosing Safety Gloves from Enviro Tech

Updated January 8th, 2020