Tensol 12 Health & Saftey

[david656]

humm it may just be a co-incidence but i was using tensol cement and didn't know much about the stuff... and now i can barley speak and did have a burning feeling in my neck... just a cold, bug... or tensol !
 

[SavannahLion]

I've never heard of Tensol. Did you check the MSDS for Tensol to see what possible side effects are?

Sometimes it could be a coincidence, sometimes not.

--Long story, stop reading if you like--

It's been a few years since I've done this, but I worked with pure clear and black silicon caulking. usually I did this on my days off from the restauraunt, but one day I had to patch something before the wet snow hit on a day I worked. So I did the job and went to my work. There we're required by law to wash our hands then sanitize with a hand sanitizer. Which I did. Within about 30 minutes my hands and upper arms broke out in a strawberry-like rash. Went to the docs and they could find nothing wrong (turns out he was an idiot anyways). The rash went away and I didn't see it for another month. Again, I was working with the silicon when the restaraunt called me in. Again, same rash (though not nearly as serious as the first time) appeared. Again I went back to the docs, again the same moronic response and a prescription of hydrocortisone(sp?).

I had realized that a possible connection was the silicon and sanitizer. Neither of which I would handle on the same day. So I did an experiment. A week later, I put some silicon on my upper arm in the same manner as I would have if I worked with my hands. Went to work and put hand sanitizer on the same spot and the rash appeared on the upper arm, but not on my lower arms where I was careful not to get silicon (the hand I used to apply the sanitizer did get a mild rash). Did the same test again but did the application a full 24 hours apart. Nothing.

As near as I can tell from the haz sheets, it's a reaction between one of the "solvents" in the brand of silicon I was using and the brand of hand sanitizer. Since I would break out in a rash only on the same day, this meant the solvents would have left my skin or evaporated completely (or whatever) leaving nothing behind for the sanitizer to react with.