Although reports indicate that repetitive motion injuries are declining due to widespread awareness and implementation of effective preventive measures, they remain a problem for many workplaces and workers. If they’re a problem for you and some of your employees, maybe it’s time to turn the spotlight on prevention.
Step up your employee awareness training. Prevention of repetitive motion injuries starts with effective training for all employees at risk. Training objectives should feature:
- Recognition of workplace risk factors for musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) and methods for controlling them
- Identification of signs and symptoms of MSDs
- Workplace procedures designed to address and control risk factors
- The role of employees in preventing MSDs and ways employees can participate in your ergonomics program
- Procedures for reporting risk factors and MSD symptoms
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Pinpoint job hazards and control measures. Another essential step is to analyze jobs where hazards might exist and implement effective control measures. This means:
- Putting an emphasis on job hazard analysis to identify MSD risk factors
- Conducting periodic medical examinations to screen for ergonomic problems in specific jobs
- Identifying effective ways to implement and evaluate control measures.
Set objectives for ergonomic problem solving. You also have to focus on ergonomic problem solving throughout the organization. To do that you can:
- Identify the departments, areas, and jobs with risk factors through a review of workplace reports, records, walkthroughs, and surveys.
- Establish department-level ergonomic safety committees to identify and solve repetitive motion injury problems.
- Develop workable solutions to control ergonomic hazards based on job analyses findings and suggestions from employees, management, safety consultants, and others.
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Highlight prevention training for supervisors. Without cooperation and initiative at the supervisory level, no ergonomic policy can be successful. To help prevent repetitive motion injuries among their workers, supervisors must be trained to:
- Understand repetitive motion problems and recognize the symptoms of illness.
- Respond to employees’ concerns regarding ergonomic problems.
- Ensure that workstation evaluations are conducted as necessary.
- Ensure that employees who engage in highly repetitive work have frequent, short work breaks and can switch to alternate work activities from time to time to give their bodies a break from repetitive motions.
- Promptly report all repetitive motion injuries to the appropriate authority within the organization.
- Continually monitor the work areas and employees they supervise for proper ergonomic practices and conditions.
Why It Matters…
- Repetitive motion injuries account for hundreds of thousands of lost workdays every year.
- OSHA estimates that preventing just one MSD results in an annual savings of $27,700.
- OSHA requires that you provide a safe workplace, and while ergonomics are not specifically mentioned, the General Duty Clause covers any injury-causing work situation.
- The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires that you reasonably accommodate employees with disabilities, and redesigning workstations may be a reasonable accommodation in some cases involving repetitive motion injuries.