Footwear, clean premises are crucial to preventing falls at work
It is only natural for news stories that relate to workplace accidents and work injuries to focus on the negatives, such as how an employee was reckless or how an employer failed to uphold safety standards and protocols. While these aspects are obviously important to any workplace accident case (may they happen here in Denver, Colorado or a remote corner of the country) it is obviously better to never have the accident in the first place. So what can employees and employers alike do to help prevent these accidents?
When you consider that roughly 15 percent of fall incidents account for work-related accidents, and that these falls often deal people very serious injuries, this is a very important area of workplace safety to address. As employees get older, these falls can pose especially dangerous hip injury threats that couple inhibit or cripple a fall victim.
One crucial safety tip is for all workers to wear proper footwear, especially in heavy industries, warehouses, construction sites and weather-related jobs. Wearing footwear that has significant grip and gives employees the confidence to perform their job without the fear of a fall is a huge part of preventing falls. This can also be significant for an employee who may still suffer a fall despite their footwear. It eliminates the employer’s excuse that the employee was somehow partially at fault for failing to wear proper footwear.
Two other crucial steps to preventing workplace falls depend on the employer keeping their premises in order. For example, they need to keep their floors clean and free of wet spots or unsafe conditions. When they are cleaning, there may be wet spots on the ground — and they need to alert their employees to such hazards.
Source: Colorado Springs Business Journal, “Preventing slips, trips and falls in the workplace — and at home,” Feb. 13, 2014
