Industrial Hygienists: Experts at Finding Hidden Mold

6/18/2021 (Permalink)

Mold colonies in Apison, TN

How To Find Hidden Mold In Your Home

Your Apison, TN, home may be your castle, but you certainly don’t want it smelling like one. If there are visible signs of mold growth, you know it is time to call a mold remediation and restoration professional to take care of the problem and ensure proper mold cleaning. When there are no visible signs, but the smell keeps permeating in different areas, it is worth considering have a mold test completed by a certified industrial hygienist. They are highly trained professionals who will conduct air and surface testing.

Air Testing
Since mold quickly grows and sends spores out to form new colonies, the spores in your home may continually change and move. An inspector will conduct various tests to take back to the lab, which helps ensure that mold cleaning is done where it needs to be. They will first take air samples. Three common methods for this include:

Impaction Samplers: A calibrated air pump impacts spores on a microscope slide.
Cassette Samplers: Often only used once, it uses forced air to impact spores for collection.
Particle Collectors: These contain spores onto a culture dish.

Surface Testing
Surface samples will also be taken and sent back to the lab, which provides better insight into your home’s mold damage problem. Common methods for taking these samples are:

Bulk: A section of an area, such as drywall, is removed and send to the lab.
Swab: Similar to medical methods, a cotton swab is swept over an area, sealed and sent for testing.
Tape: A piece of tape is adhered to a section and gently removed, bringing with it any mold to test.

Once both tests are completed and the molds analyzed, you will have a scientific understanding of the scope of your issues. These tests also can pinpoint the type of mold. After you have had remediation done, an industrial hygienist will conduct industry-standard testing to ensure your problem was taken care of.
While mold cleaning may be an obvious task when visible mold is present, sometimes it is lurking out of sight. Professional testing can you help find the problem and eradicate it.