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1. Get hard data to deal with environmental factors
2. 11^th World Conference on Injury Prevention – plan to attend
3. Do workplace wellness programmes reduce presenteeism? 
4. ‘Moving and Handling People: The New Zealand Guidelines 2012’ is here!
5. DPI New Entitlement Claims - Monthly Result

Get hard data to deal with environmental factors

We often take our physical environment for granted. We almost always have clean air to breathe, relative peace and quiet, and a comfortable place to sit or stand. But what happens when your workplace environment is less than ideal? And what happens if you don’t do anything about it?

What makes environmental contributory factors important?

The physical environment where work happens is a backdrop for all other work systems and processes. It has a significant (if sometimes subtle) impact on worker comfort levels and health.

Environmental contributory factors include (amongst others) temperature, ventilation, humidity, airborne contaminants, vibration, noise and lighting levels. When workers are working in areas where these factors are not at comfortable levels, their wellbeing and productivity can be affected. It’s important to note that individual responses to environmental contributory factors will vary from person to person.

Environmental contributory factors can contribute to worker discomfort, pain or injury in many ways. Problems may appear quite suddenly, such as the onset of acute low back pain, or they may appear gradually after many years of exposure.

How do environmental contributory factors become a problem?

Many factors affect the workplace environment. These include weather conditions, building design, equipment used and the work that’s being done, and sometimes even the people doing the work. Problems often happen when something changes in the workplace and the new combination of environmental factors causes discomfort. Let’s revisit our imaginary business from last month and see how it might happen there.

The team at MakeItUp Manufacturing took action on the problems they had with their work organisation. Now work comes in more smoothly and their machinery is working for more hours each day. This is great for business profits, but it has created an unexpected problem - the workshop has become hot and noisy.

The workshop is in an old warehouse. It has no ventilation system installed and noise from the machines bounces off the wooden walls. MakeItUp started up in winter and there were lots of equipment failures, so the workshop was relatively quiet and comfortable. But with warmer weather and increasing workloads the machine operators are feeling the heat.

The workers get sweaty palms in the higher temperatures. This means they have to grip their tools more tightly than usual which leads to muscle fatigue. Without realising it, some of them become dehydrated. Their thinking becomes fuzzy and tempers fray.

Communication is difficult in the noisy environment, and as a result there have been a couple of near misses with the cutting machines that could easily have turned out very badly. Workers are also complaining about going home with ringing in their ears.

When and where are environmental contributory factors likely to arise?

This group of factors can have an impact almost anywhere. In any work area there is likely to be some aspect of the environment which needs to be addressed. The issues range from subtle things such as glare from a beautiful view out of a window that is directly behind a computer screen, to the more obvious things, such as filleting fish in the cold conditions on a fishing boat.

It can be difficult to meet business demands and at the same time provide a comfortable environment for workers, for example industrial workplaces with large chillers, freezers or ovens. Equipment can be hot or noisy and/or vibrate excessively.

People who work outdoors have no control over what the weather does. Some may be able to move indoors or stop if the weather turns bad, but many others have to keep going.

Is there interaction between environmental contributory factors and the other groups?

Remember that all of the groups of contributory factors interact with each other to some extent. The degree of interaction always depends upon the situation and this is how they produce the combination effect. The environmental group of contributory factors often interacts with these other groups:

• Individual factors – Each worker responds differently to the challenges from their physical work environment. What is fine for one may not be fine for all. It can often be difficult to keep everyone happy and sometimes you need to compromise.
• Loads and forceful movements – The ease (or otherwise) of doing physical activities is directly affected by the environment in which the physical activity takes place. Seasonal weather changes often have an impact.

What happens if environmental contributory factors aren’t dealt with?

Humans automatically adapt to their environment. For example, if it’s cold we put on another layer. If it’s hot we take something off, have a cool drink and find shade. We only have problems when environmental challenges outstrip our ability to adapt to them.

In the same way, workers often do what they can to cope with challenging work conditions. There’s a catch here – the worker may not know the best way to do this and/or may not have the necessary equipment. In any case the required solution may be much more than they can do on their own.

Meanwhile the uncomfortable environment is a disincentive to come to work. If problems persist the worker may ask a supervisor for help, or simply look for another job. In this way environmental issues can lead to absenteeism and worker retention problems.

Many environmental factors and their damaging effects were once accepted as a normal part of a job, but this attitude is changing. When workers understand the problems associated with their work they look to their employer to manage them appropriately. If this doesn’t happen, in the long term the business can suffer from low morale, loss of productivity, worker ill health or even an industrial dispute.

How do you deal with environmental factors effectively?

1. Get expert assistance to measure environmental factors in your workplace.
   
   Individual responses of workers to environmental factors are subjective and don’t form a good basis for decision making. Expert assistance comes at a cost but it is money well spent and is almost always the cheapest solution in the long run.
   
   Start by contacting the New Zealand Occupational Hygiene Society. They’ll connect you to an expert (probably an occupational hygienist, depending upon your needs) who can help you.
   
   Your expert will visit your workplace to identify and measure environmental factors. The measurements will be compared with relevant international standards, and then your expert will make suggestions about what needs to change. This information will be given to you in a written report.
   
   When you have hard data about what’s going on in your workplace you’ll know what the real problems are. They may not be what you think.
    
2. Tell your workers what you’re doing. When you get the report, share the results and explain what changes have been suggested. Ask them what they think about the possible changes and which ones they would do first.
    
3. With the feedback from your workers in mind, decide what to do next. Keep your workers involved as you develop an implementation plan and put it into action.
    
4. Remember to review your results at least annually. Ask the questions: ‘Have there been any changes that we need to accommodate?’ ‘Is there another way to get a better result?’

An industry approach to environmental factors

The Shearing Industry Health and Safety Committee has made progress dealing with environmental issues in the wool harvesting industry, such as hand-piece noise and vibration, shed conditions and the impact of the weather. The committee worked with Federated Farmers, Shearing Contractors, ACC and the Department of Labour to develop a set of agreed industry guidelines. These guidelines address many of the environmental issues in the wool harvesting industry.

The group also worked with wool harvesting equipment manufacturers and researchers to improve the design of shearing equipment. The redesigned equipment operates at reduced noise levels and shearers are exposed to less risk to begin with.

Tell us your story

Do you have a story about how environmental contributory factors are handled in your workplace? We’re keen to hear what’s happening ‘on the coal face’ and share the knowledge. Send your story to Maddy and we’ll do our best to publish it in a future edition of Connected.

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11^th World Conference on Injury Prevention – plan to attend

ACC is hosting the 11^th World Conference on Injury Prevention and Safety Promotion (Safety 2012) in Wellington from 1-4 October 2012, co-sponsored by the World Health Organisation.

Safety 2012 brings together the world’s leading injury prevention and safety researchers, practitioners and advocates from more than 130 countries.  The theme for Safety 2012 is “Connecting pathways for a vibrant and safer future”. The overall goal is to strengthen the fields of injury and violence prevention and safety promotion internationally.

Further information (including a draft programme naming Keynote and State of the Art speakers along with information on satellite meetings) is available on the Safety 2012 website www.safety2012.org.nz.

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Do workplace wellness programmes reduce presenteeism?

Presenteeism happens when workers are present at work but are limited in their job performance by poor health, or an unrecognised or unaddressed physical or mental health problem. Some employers have set up workplace wellness programmes in an attempt to reduce presenteeism and improve on-the-job performance.

The question is - do these programmes work? A recent review of the evidence suggests that some do work and points to programme components which help to make them successful.

According to a research review out of Ontario’s Lakehead University, some workplace wellness programmes do reduce presenteeism. Findings from the research review were published in May 2011 in BMC Public Health, an open-access journal from BioMed Central.

“The most important issue for organizations to address is not whether these programmes should be implemented, but rather how they should be implemented, designed and evaluated for optimal results,” says IWH Associate Scientist Dr. Carlo Ammendolia, co-author of the study.

Presenteeism on the rise

Presenteeism emerged as a business issue in the 1990s. It refers to the impact of an employee’s physical and emotional health on their job performance. The potential productivity losses include time not spent on job tasks and decreased quality of work.

Although often hidden, the costs related to presenteeism are estimated to be higher than those related to absenteeism. They are also being driven up by an increasing number of people with chronic health conditions and an aging workforce.

Little is known about the effects of workplace wellness programmes on presenteeism. Are these programmes effective in reducing presenteeism among employees? If so, what makes them successful? The recent research review aimed to find answers for these (and other) questions.

What works to reduce presenteeism?

After screening over 2,000 articles, 47 articles were found to be relevant to the review’s questions and 14 were accepted as scientifically sound with respect to their validity and reliability. In the end, the review team found ten workplace wellness programme interventions that helped to reduce presenteeism. They ranged from worksite exercise and telephone support programmes, to lighting level changes and extra rest breaks.

Looking at these ten interventions, the review team identified a number of programme components that potentially helped to make them effective in reducing presenteeism. They found preliminary evidence to support the use of one or more of the following in workplace wellness programmes:

• involving supervisors and managers
• targeting organisational and/or environmental factors to influence behaviour
• using health-risk assessments or other methods to screen workers before they enter programmes
• improving supervisor/manager knowledge of mental health in the workplace
• allowing physical exercise to take place during working hours
• tailoring programmes to the needs of individual workers
• using behavioural change models to help reinforce desirable lifestyle behaviours
• providing workers with incentives
• using participatory approaches that involve employees
• increasing the frequency and length of rest breaks for at-risk employees.

The value of healthy workers

It takes time, thought, effort and investment to put together a well designed workplace wellness programme. But a successful programme can help individuals to make positive changes and then the organisation benefits from the service of healthier workers. When those workers go home, the community benefits as well.

You can read this story online, and access the full article at: www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2458/11/395 .

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‘Moving and Handling People: The New Zealand Guidelines 2012’ is here!

After nearly three years in the making, the new Moving and Handling People: The New Zealand Guidelines 2012 reflect current evidence based practice for moving and handling people in New Zealand, consistent with international standards. They replace the New Zealand Patient Handling Guidelines: the Liten Up Approach (2003), and are available to health sector workers, carers, their managers, and to people who design health care facilities. You can learn about them at regional workshops coming up in the next few months.

The need for new guidelines

The guidelines were launched at the Auckland based Moving and Handling Conference from 21 - 23 March, and were very well received.

“We’ve received extremely positive feedback on these guidelines from those attending the conference”, says Dr John Wallaart, ACC Programme Manager. “The health sector is keen to put them into practice to support ACC’s aim to reduce injuries to their workers.”

“Patient handling is the leading cause of injuries in the health sector,” says Dr Wallaart, “with most reported injuries affecting the back and shoulder. These injuries are related to a variety of factors, most of which can potentially be managed.”

“People working in the health sector are often middle-aged and may lack adequate supervision. This adds up to the need for a new set of guidelines that will help workers avoid injury, and help employers through reduced staff down-time. Employers also understand that with experience rating, more injuries result in increased ACC levies, so fewer injuries will have the opposite effect.”

Dr Wallaart also notes that the health sector is growing rapidly as the result of the ageing population and improved health care. A compounding factor is the increasing number of obese patients.

What’s in the guidelines document?

The guidelines document has 14 sections as shown below. Each section can be read independently and used as a stand-alone resource if required.

1. Introduction

2. Why moving and handling programmes are needed

3. Risk Assessment

4. Techniques for moving and handling

5. Training for moving and handling people

6. Organising training

7. Equipment for moving and handling people

8. Equipment Management

9. Facility design and upgrading

10. Policy and programme planning

11. Workplace culture

12. Monitoring and evaluation

13. Audits

14. Bariatric clients.

How do I get a copy of the guidelines?

The guidelines come as a two disk digital package Moving and Handling People: The New Zealand Guidelines 2012 (ACC6077). Call 0800 844-657 to order a copy. The guidelines include:

• On CD-ROM – the 420 page guidelines document, with background research documents
• On DVD – video of typical moving and handling techniques, designed to be used with other training and activities (not to replace hands-on practice with a qualified trainer).

Your opportunity to attend a regional workshop

Workshops will run in Auckland (23 August), Wellington (7 May), Christchurch (3 August) and Dunedin (8 June). The programme has not been finalised yet but will include the following:

• Overview of the guideline development process
• Overview of contents
• What’s new
• Speakers from the Guidelines Panel:
  • David R. Thomas, Emeritus Professor, Social and Community Health University of Auckland
  • Anne McMahon, Moving and Handling Co-ordinator from the Waitemata DHB
  • Dr John Wallaart, ACC Programme Manager
  • Chris Polaczuk, ACC DPI Programme Manager
• Insights into Queensland Government experiences implementing the guidelines they developed in 2010 (Australian speaker)
• Practical technique session.

For more information about the workshops please email Dr John Wallaart, ACC Programme Manager..

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DPI New Entitlement Claims - Monthly Result

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