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Nearly 3 out of every 100 people suffered work-related injuries during 2015.
The cost of these injuries can be high to your business. Plus, dealing with the administration is time-consuming. You need to process injury reports, potentially make insurance claims -- it all builds up.
There any many work-related injuries your company could easily prevent. Here are some of the most common. We'll also tell you how to protect your employees from them.
Sprains and Strains
If your employees are not lifting, pushing or pulling heavy items in the correct way, they might suffer strains or sprains.
A strain is a muscular stretch or tear. It can also impact and harm a tendon. A sprain is ligament damage. This is the band of tissue which connects the bones at the joints.
It's important that your staff are trained to lift properly. This means bending their knees with a straight back - and not hunching over. Poor lifting technique can also cause back problems.
However, physically training your staff can prevent many of these injuries by improving their core strength, as well as teaching correct techniques. Good core strength protects back muscles. This helps to prevent back injuries.
Slips, Trips, and Falls
It's important that your staff wear appropriate footwear, and that cleaning staff use 'wet floor' signs to avoid slips. These simple actions can help to prevent falling injuries.
Making sure your staff are well-rested with regular rotations that give them time to recover. This can help avoid these accidents. Why? This is because they're likely to be paying more attention to where they're going and what they're doing when well-rested.
However, sometimes people are just unlucky. If your employees have very physical roles in your business, appropriate exercise can help them recover faster from work-related injuries.
How to Identify Other Common Injuries
The actual injuries that occur from business to business can vary.
So, you need to be recording incidents as they occur. You should also be taking the time to analyze the data to understand how, when, and why injuries are happening.
If, for example, you realize that people are hurting themselves when hauling heavy objects, train them to do it properly. Or, you could invest in assistive equipment to help them move.
If you notice that some employees are taking 'shortcuts' with their tasks, resulting in injuries, make sure everyone is aware of safety protocols. Also, make sure your line managers are enforcing these.
We can help to advise you on a targeted physical training program that will help your employees to avoid common workplace injuries.
Staff Training to Prevent Work-Related Injuries
By making your staff aware of hazards, and by investing in training which keeps your workforce fit and healthy, you're taking a proactive approach. This will help to prevent work-related injuries before they happen.
Work-Fit's goal is to apply sports medicine in the workplace to lower the occurrence of injuries. This will save you time and money.
Contact us today for details on how our preventative training program can benefit your business and increase your profit margin.
