Preventing Hazards in the Workplace

The first step to understanding how to prevent workplace injuries is to know why they often occur.

• Shortcuts – Getting the job done as quickly as possible is often the cause of many workplace accidents.
• Weather – Poor weather conditions on outside worksites can lead to workplace injuries and accidents. Working in inclement weather may specifically lead to an increase in overexertion and falls.

Musculoskeletal rehabilitation is a set of treatments that can help you recover strength and the ability to move your muscles and joints. This kind of treatment may be used after an accident, injury, or disease that makes you less able to move your muscles or joints.

Your musculoskeletal system is the muscles and bones in your body. These are the parts of your body that help you move, lift, and work with tools.

Applying a scientific, evidence-based approach to your ergonomics process is important. The goal is to identify ergonomic risk factors, quantify them, and then make measurable improvements to the workplace, ensuring that jobs and tasks are within workers’ capabilities and limitations. The best approach for doing this is to make ergonomics an ongoing process of risk identification and risk reduction based on objective, scientific analysis of your workplace.

The Physical Demand Analysis is the first crucial step in the development of a comprehensive injury management program. It includes analytical measures of the physical requirements to perform the essential and marginal job tasks, identifies maximum forces, cognitive and skill requirements, reports positional tolerances, outlines necessary machinery, tools, an environmental factors. The PDA also uses ergonomic principles to determine alternative methods of performing tasks and assess risk factors, taking into consideration the possible need for reasonable accommodations.

An employer approach to improving employee health, wellness programs include activities such as company-sponsored exercise, weight-loss competitions, educational seminars, tobacco-cessation programs, and health screenings that are designed to help employees eat better, lose weight, and improve overall physical health.