Page 32 - Occupational Health & Safety, July 2017

FALL PREVENTION
Plan Ahead to Get the Job Done Safely
Preventing slips & falls is the only way to keep your company on firm ground.
BY RANDY BOSS
■ Wet or greasy floors
■ Dry floors with wood dust or powder
■ Uneven walking surfaces
■ Polished or freshly waxed floors
■ Loose flooring, carpeting, or mats
■ Transition from one floor type to another ■ Missing or uneven floor tiles and bricks
■ Damaged or irregular steps; no handrails
■ Sloped walking surfaces
■ Shoes with wet, muddy, greasy, or oily soles Clutter
■ Electrical cords or cables
■ Damaged ladder steps
■ Ramps and gangplanks without skid-resistant
surfaces
■ Metal surfaces—dock plates, construction
plates
Take a look at your job site with this list in hand. If
you see nothing that fits this list, then you are a credit to workplace safety. But chances are most compa- nies will check off several items, and for every item checked off, the collateral damage will be escalating insurance rates, an Experience Mod trending in the wrong direction, and a big target on your company’s back when OSHA pays a visit.
So what to do? Okay, here’s job safety 101—wear good-quality, non-slip shoes. You don’t need a quali- fied Risk Advisor to tell you that. Chances are your mother has been saying it since you were six years old. Unfortunately, Mom never worked in a fast- paced workplace where around every corner lurked a virtual minefield of potential hazards, whether it’s a construction site, manufacturing plant, grocery store, hotel resort, or the kitchen of the local Arby’s. But if she did—and Mom always knows best—here is some advice she might share:
Safety and housekeeping go hand in hand. Know what needs to be done and who’s going to do it (which also comes in handy when something isn’t done).
1. Create a clean workplace environment.
Safety and housekeeping go hand-in-hand, which will reduce the chance of employee injuries, rising insurance costs, and OSHA fines. This should be an ongoing procedure that is simply done as part of each worker’s daily performance. Know what needs to be done and who’s going to do it (which also comes in handy when something isn’t done).
2. Eliminate wet or slippery surfaces.
Wet surfaces account for a significant portion of injuries reported by state agencies. Some of the most
32 Occupational Health & Safety | JULY 2017
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It’s probably happened to most of us, at least once or twice. Maybe it’s a sliver of ice in the driveway, your son’s toy car left in the living room, or that cleanup in aisle 6 that didn’t happen fast enough
last time you went shopping. And for the most part, the result might have been a stubbed toe, a bruised rear end, or maybe a little bit of embarrassment. But the event never really seemed life-threatening.
Now, picture a slip and fall when you’re carrying 100-pound bags of cement or on a catwalk crossing over a vat of molten steel, balancing on a 50-foot ex- tension ladder, or something as simple as an office worker tripping on an uneven sidewalk while getting the mail. That is when the game changes, and not for the good.
According to the U.S. Department of Labor, slips, trips, and falls make up the majority of general indus- try accidents, which account for:
■ 15 percent of all accidental deaths per year, the second-leading cause behind motor vehicles
■ About 25 percent of all reported injury claims per fiscal year
■ More than 95 million lost work days per year— about 65 percent of all work days lost
In general, slips and trips occur due to a loss of traction between the shoe and the walking surface or an inadvertent contact with a fixed or moveable ob- ject that may lead to a fall. There are a variety of situ- ations that may cause slips, trips, and falls, according to DOL:
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