Home Maintenance in your home can often be a challenge if you don’t know exactly what to fix or where the problems are occurring. Mold is a common problem. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has warned against allowing mold to fester in any home or workplace; a link between respiratory disease and fungal growths has been made, while excessive mold can cause structural damage to a building’s foundations, leading to potential danger further down the line.

Home Maintenance: How To Know If You Need Mold Removal

In order to combat mold, you first need to identify it. How do you know if you have mold in your home? Mold thrives in damp places as The New York Times reports. Take a look and see what symptoms you and your family could be experiencing to trigger if you have mold.

Most Common Mold Allergy Symptoms:

In most cases, people have no reaction to mold and will likely discover the problem through the smell. However, some members of a household may well have an allergic response to its presence, displaying symptoms similar to those triggered by pollen or animal hair.

The most common symptoms are:

• Feeling congested
• Watering eyes
• Coughing
• Sore throat
• Irritated skin
• Itchy eyes
• Itchy ears
• Hives

If mold is left undetected and in place, ongoing exposure can lead to serious health concerns beyond these initial symptoms.

Effects of mold on your health

Ongoing exposure to mold can lead to skin rashes, aggravate asthma, and (rarely) fungal infections may well affect those with extensive immune diseases. These effects are usually temporary, and should clear up following the removal of the mold itself.

In extreme cases, mold may pose a greater risk to households’ health. There are around 16 species of mold which release toxic chemicals (mycotoxins), triggering symptoms like:

• Bleeding
• Impaired mentality
• Damaged internal organs (after prolonged exposure)
• Cancer (after prolonged exposure)

The most poisonous, harmful species of toxic mold is perhaps the most well-known: black mold. Black mold.Award Space warns of black mold having a certain odor. If this is spotted in the home, it should be removed as soon as possible.

How to know if you need mold removal

If you see or smell mold in your home, the key step is to arrange removal while actually combating the moisture issue causing its growth. Simply taking the mold away will not solve the problem.

While some households may well attempt to do this themselves, it is best avoided: professional mold remediation services can do this for you. Mold is typically caused by a leaking roof, burst pipe, flooding, rising damp, or structural problems; condensation is also a common cause.

Mold remediation by mold removal professionals

After hiring a mold removal service, households should take steps to prevent mold returning in the future. A mold-killing product should be used on all surfaces affected by the growth as well as those which appear clean – spores may well have made their way to parts of the room in question discretely.

Mold remediation professionals will wear protective gear when handling mold and treating the affected area. This clothing and equipment includes:

• Goggles
• Dust filter or respirator
• Full-body suit
• Gloves

The room containing the mold itself will be sealed off, to eliminate the threat of spores filtering to other areas of the home. The process itself is time-consuming, but professionals will ensure the problem has been handled effectively to avoid further health-concerns.

For more home maintenance tips on Stagetecture review our archives.