27: Q&A: ERMI sample doesn’t have enough dust... now what?

Hello again, everyone, and welcome to today's show. If you're one of the 130 million people that are dealing with Sirs Lyme disease, autoimmune disease, or other conditions that are impacted by mold on a daily basis, and you need to learn how to eliminate that exposure, then you're in the right place. My name is Brian Carr, and you're listening to Mold Finders Radio.

Hey, guys, how we doing? I wanted to talk to you all about this question I got. It was a really good question. No one has really asked it before, but I do come across this happening. And if we're going down the road of doing remediation and trying to make sure everything's done the right way, then this is definitely part of that process. So I want to spend some time on this. This might be the only thing I even really cover on this Q and A right now. Sorry if you guys heard my horn, I just honked at someone again, driving to an appointment. So this is. I should call this like mold finding in the car. I think that's what this should be called now. But anyway, okay. So the question was about an ermi. I don't have it specifically in front of me, but essentially the question read, we had remediation done at the house. There was a post test that was done, which was an ermi. So when we say a post test, what that means is that the remediation was complete. Right? So the remediator said that they did their job, and so testing was done on the back end to validate that all the mold was actually removed properly. They used an ERMI to do the post testing. And what happened when they got the results back was that there was not enough dust on the ERMI sample to even be analyzed. And so this was the question. And basically the question was, does this mean that everything is good or does this not mean that everything is good because there wasn't anything to see on the sample? And it's a really good question. And about maybe two years ago was the first time that I ran into this on a project that I did, and it turned into this big process that took probably six months of talking to all the labs and really, really learning more about how the samples are analyzed and the whole process. Process to understand what's happening. So talk about ERMI for a second. ERMI is a dust collection method, right? And so what's happening is that they're looking at dust, they're running it through this analyzation process, and they're identifying the mold species that are present. Well, it requires a certain amount of dust in order for that to work. Right. So the, the, the way that the algorithms are all built, it's built off of 5 milligrams of dust. And so the concept is that if you're not able to collect close to that amount of dust, then the analyzation process just doesn't work. Right. It just kind of like breaks it. Okay. So they can't figure it out. And there is a little bit of a variance. You could get a little under that amount of dust and still be able to get results. So there's kind of a standard deviation sort of variance there for you. But the idea is that there has to be dust to analyze. If there's no dust to analyze, then you can't run an ERMI sample because there's nothing to look at. And so conceptually, we have to think about what we're trying to achieve from a mold remediation perspective and why we even do dust testing in the first place. Okay. So when you're bringing someone on to do remediation and you're getting to the point where you're dealing with fine particles and you're looking at Hermes and potentially mycotoxins and things like that, then they're really being tasked with two things. The first thing that the remediation company is being tasked with is to actually remove the growth sources that are on whatever structural building components that exist in the house that were contaminated. So, for example, if you had mold in a wall, you're going to take and you're going to remove all the drywall that was impacted. But then you have the two by fours and the framing and all the other kind of structural components that you can't remove. So all of that then is going to get abrasively cleaned. So I think in the last episode I talked about abrasive surface cleaning. So this is where you would execute that. And basically the idea is that mold kind of grows like a tree or a plant. It has roots, it grows into something. So you have to sand or wire brush or abrasively get that stuff out of there. So that's the first part of it. However, when there's a mold issue, it doesn't just stay on the surface. It moves into the air. When it gets in the air, then it settles down into the dust reservoirs, and the dust reservoirs get resuspended and popped up into our breathing zone on a regular basis. It's called the human cloud effect. And so we, that's why we do dust Testing in the house, that's our most direct pathway to exposure. That's showing us what's constantly getting popped into our breathing zone and what we're getting hit with. So for remediation, if we're really trying to eliminate all of that stuff, we have to have processes in place to handle both of those issues. So the first issue is the actual source growth that's happening on the framing and the structural components. The second piece is any of the fragments or the pieces of the mole colonies that have moved away from the framing, from the sources, into our living space, down into the dust reservoirs. So if we only remediated the first piece, we only handled the structural stuff, and we did nothing to clean the particles that are floating around and have settled in the dust reservoirs in the house, you're still going to have all of your exposure issues because all of that is still there. Right? Because they didn't remove it. So that's why you're looking at these two pieces. So I am assuming that for the first part of this conversation that the source remediation was done properly and all the sources are gone. So I'm just going to assume that for right now, which means they moved on to the second phase of remediation, which was doing the fine particle cleaning process. We call this a home cleanse. Different people have different versions of what they call this, but the point is to get these small particles out of the house. So one is that you're basically removing as much of the dust in the house as you possibly can. And part of that is actually doing a forced fogging process that brings any airborne particles down to the surfaces. So now you're able to wipe them and get rid of them. Fogging alone does not do this. Okay? Fogging is not going to get rid of everything. It's just going to bring it down to the surfaces. So after you fog, you then have to wipe everything away. And so if all of that happened properly, and what I'm talking through now, just so you guys know, is the really top line explanation of the remediation protocols that I provided in MOLE masterclass. So this is our process, okay? So you could see the actual step by step plan of how all this is executed in MOLE masterclass. In one of the modules, I walk through every single step. So this is just like Cliff Notes version of that. So if they went through and did all that, okay, and then they went through and they did an ermi, and the ERMI came up with not enough dust.

Then that's kind of a Good thing. Okay. Because they were tasked with removing all the dust and particles that they could remove in the house. If they did a thorough ERMI collection and they didn't find enough, then that means that there's not enough there to sample, which means that there's not a lot of dust there for the mold and particles to harbor in, which means that the exposure isn't going to be there for you because the accumulation points aren't there. So does that make sense? Is that all kind of clicking like how that philosophically works? Right. The theory behind that, if it's not there in the first place, then that's ultimately what we're looking for. And so the first time that I did this and I saw this happen to myself, I started questioning like, oh, why is this happening? What's wrong with the testing methods? Is there something wrong with the collection? Like, what's happening? Why? Why am I getting a result that basically says they were unable to run it? Right. Like, almost as if there was a problem with the sample. Right. Technically, there was a problem with the analysis because the analysis didn' have the dust that it needed. However, in my situation, it wasn't really a problem because the remediation was done really well. Now, if the only test they're doing is an ERMI test, I don't really like that. The post testing should include multiple things. I'll get to that in one second.

Actually. Let me do that right now.

Like I said, there's two different pieces of remediation. There's the structural stuff and then there is what has moved into the living spaces. Right. So there's two different cleaning plans. We have to sample different ways to understand if each of those were successful. So for the source surface growth stuff. Right. So that was in the framing and the structural components. The first thing you need to do is surface testing. That's not the ERMI test, just your basic swab microscopy testing. You want to do that to make sure that all of that was removed properly. Okay, that's important.

And then we do. After all of that clears, then we come back in and we do the ERMI testing afterwards to check now for the particles that broke off the colonies. So think of it this way. It's like the colony is the factory. Okay. So the first time that we're testing, we're looking to see if the factory was actually bulldozed and demolished. The second set of testing is to make sure that all the air pollution the factory created before it was demolished was also removed. So that's the two Levels of testing. Now, if I'm doing post testing, I'm not only doing an ERMI test for the second phase. So we talked about the fine particle phase. I'm not only doing an ERMI test, I'm also doing a mycotoxin test and I'm also doing an endotoxin test. Okay. So the thing with the ERMI is that there's a limitation on the amount of dust that you have to provide. Right. And there is some of that with other sampling methods too, but it just kind of breaks the whole sample if you don't have enough.

Now, if I run the mycotoxin, the ERMI and an endotoxin, which is bacterial toxins, if I do all three of those and the mycotoxins come back negative and the endotoxins come back within normal ranges, and the ERMI then comes back and says there's not enough dust to analyze, then I'm super thrilled with that result. That means that the place is really clean. Okay. There are times where I've done an ERMI that did not have enough dust yet. A mycotoxin still came back and there was a presence of mycotoxins there. So I would at least do a mycotoxin test also just to really confirm that for you. Right. And make sure that the reason that the ERMI is coming up with a non detectable amount is solely because there's just not enough volume of dust for the algorithm to work and not because.

It'S not tested. Let me say it another way. So that the only reason that the ERMI is coming up the way that it's coming up is because of the dust issue. Right. And not for another reason. So if we're looking at the mycotoxin and we see that that is coming back negative, and then we see that ERMI is not like there's not enough to do an analysis, then I'm happy with that. And then if we couple that with the surface testing of the different structural components in the remediated zones and we see that all that stuff looks good, then I feel really good about where we are in the remediation place. Okay, so that's kind of an overview of what that is.

I want to talk quickly about ERMI collection though, because the way the ermie is collected can really dictate if you get enough dust or not. Okay, sometimes. And I, you know.

I'm not gonna throw names or anything like that, but I've heard people say that, well, if we don't really just if we just don't wipe a lot of areas with the Ermie, then it's gonna come up and it's gonna show not enough dust and then that means there's not enough mold and that means we're gonna pass, right? So if the way the sample was collected, like I can, I can go into a house and I can collect a sample in different ways for an ermie to change what I want the result to look like, meaning I could collect not enough dust and get just a non detectable amount, or I can do a really thorough collection throughout the house and I can get enough dust and then I can see what's there. So a lot of times when remediators or inspectors are trying to clear.

You know, they want the house to clear, right? They want the project to be done, they can go in and they can actually just really kind of just barely touch certain areas of the house on the ermi, try to keep it low, right? And then if it comes back and it shows there's not enough dust, then they can say, oh, well, there's not enough dust. So that's a good thing. Okay. It's hard, it's hard for you to know because you're not in there doing it. So it's just, you know, a conversation that you have to have with whoever's collecting the sample and you have to be comfortable with them, right? And if you have them going along this long throughout the process and there was a level of trust that was there, and if they tell you they did it, then you have to take their word for it, you know, if they did it the right way. But the, the way that I collect Hermes in a house as a post is I go through every room of the house and I do, I do multiple surfaces in every room and that's how I collect them, right? So I'm not like, I'm not avoiding the rooms that had remediation done. You know, that's one thing that you can do if you're collecting. You say, okay, well, we did the surface testing, like just the swab testing on the framing in these containment areas. So I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna do the ERMI over those, right? Some people will think of it that way. And I think that you do need to include that in the ERMI test that you do. And so one way that you could do it is you could actually split the ERMI post test into doing one that's in the containment remediated areas. And then you could do one that's Just in the rest of the house where there actually wasn't like structural remediation that was done that way if one of them comes back elevated and the other one doesn't, and the one that came back elevated, you know where it was. Right. So you can really focus the follow up cleaning on that section. But I think, and the way that we do it is that your ermi, your mycotoxin testing, your endotoxin testing, if you choose to do that piece of it, includes all of the areas of the house, both the contained areas of previous remediation, of where the remediation happened for the sources, as well as just a composite throughout the entire house and whether or not we want to split, split that into two different tests so two different batches. We could talk to the client about that and explain the pros and cons of doing that. The con is really money. That's the con of doing it because you're doubling up the tests. But if they're okay with doing that, it gives us more direction on if something does fail, what kind of cleaning is needed and where it needs to be done.

I hope that that is helpful understanding of how the post testing process works, how the remediation process works, and a little more information on how the ERMI is analyzed. Because like I said, when I saw this for the first time, I didn't know what was going on either. And I ended up talking to multiple labs, spending hours learning how the analysis process happens. What are the thresholds of like how much dust do you actually need? When do the numbers get skewed? Would they even report if there was lower numbers? Some of the labs that I talked to would actually send you ERMI reports when there wasn't enough dust. And when you do that, the spore equivalent counts skyrocket, they get way higher because the algorithm is basically increasing the number to make it equal to as if there was enough dust, if that makes sense. So like there's a mathematical equation that's going on and if you don't meet the baseline of the math, then it just ups all the numbers until you get to the baseline. Right? So I found that that was happening sometimes and I was like, whoa, well that isn't right at all. You can't be reporting that way, you know. And so it took a long time to really get with them and figure out the process and figure out like how all this works. All of that said right, because there's all these caveats. And truthfully the caveats have to do with the inspector and the tester and how they're going and they're collecting the samples and the entire flow of the remediation process where things done in stages where the source is actually cleaned, you know, all that stuff. But if the process was done properly. So if you follow the protocols that we put together.

And it was done in that staged out process and the samples come back and you're doing more than an ERMI on the second phase of testing, which is the home cleanse testing, and you do an ERMI and a mycotoxin and the mycotoxin comes back negative and the ERMI comes back and it shows there's not enough dust. And we've seen that all the sources also cleared, meaning the structural components also cleared and showed no problem. Then that is when I'm happy with what we see. And at that point I'll clear it at that point and everything looks good. So there was a really good question, it was a more technical question and it was more down the road. And it shows that you're really like, you're really absorbing this stuff and thinking this stuff through, which is great because hopefully that's what I want everyone who's listening to be doing. So really, really, really good question. That's why I want to spend a little more time answering this one specifically. So thank you.

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