Health and Safety

Welcome to the Institute for Human Resources Health & Safety Virtual Event! Thank you to everyone for your participation and support. The next two days mark the 1st Virtual Event for this great community. We have a very exciting event planned for you with many informative sessions covering the hot topics and trends around Health & Safety. Join Leanne Schmidt, Community Facilitator at HR.com and Advisory Board member for Health & Safety as she reviews the Institute's accomplishments thus far and highlights what’s in store for the coming months. During this short, 15-minute session, Leanne will provide an overview of the certification program (have you signed up?) and an update on hours accumulated to date. Find out what you have missed, and take a look at what is planned for the remainder of 2012. Throughout this session we will:
• Introduce you to the Advisory Board
• Introduce you to the Institute and the Certification program
• Help you become an expert in Health & Safety
• Learn why this Institute is important to the Health & Safety community and
• Learn how you can contribute to its success.

If you are new to the Institute for Health & Safety, this introduction will cover not only our past accomplishments but explain why you should continue to participate and be a part of this community. For those with questions regarding the Institute and its content, this is your chance to share your ideas. Don’t forget, this is a great opportunity to converse with our industry experts.

Looking forward to your participation!

Just as workplace health and safety requires careful planning, analysis and response, so too does protecting your business reputation. When any kind of workplace crisis occurs, the damage to your reputation can be disastrous, costly and long-lasting. The chief concern is always to provide a healthy and safe work environment to all employees, and ensuring continued safety and well-being after a crisis is the paramount objective.

Take control to safeguard your business and its reputation with thoughtful planning and response. Bettison will discuss reputation risks and provide you with tactics to handle even the most difficult reputational challenges, including media inquiries, OSHA investigations, litigation, and community relations.

While most crises to be discussed will involve health and safety in the workplace, many of the strategies to be discussed will apply, in some form or another, to other crises or critical issues, such as union contract negotiations, change of leadership, loss of a significant customer.

The strategies to be discussed will be applicable most commonly to matters that have become public, are about to become public. That said, many of the strategies are well-suited for strictly internal matters that the general public never will learn about.

Topics will include:
1) dealing with media inquiries;
2) controlling flow of information and ensuring accurate information;
3) communications with key stakeholders (timing, content and tone);
4) advancing legal strategies w/o looking defensive (particularly after a citation has been issued, and after OSHA issues a press release);
5) reputation rehabilitation for the long term in light of inicident.

Most safety professionals are concerned with ergonomics and the aging population. When asked why, many express fear of anticipated increases in injury rates. As we age, workplace and tool design is increasingly important since significant physiological changes occur that can exacerbate the potential for workplace musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) and quality errors. Some physiological changes include, but are not limited to:

• Movement speed slows during grasping and reaching
• Movement precision (deceleration) decreases
• Range of motion is reduced
• Muscle strength (grip, push, pull) decreases
• Force control decreases, as adults grip twice as hard to compensate
• Force perception decreases
• Muscle endurance decreases
• Visual acuity, speed and precision decreases

In this presentation, participants will learn how to identify ergonomic risk factors using scientific tools and will understand ergonomic design guidelines for the aging population. Attendees will also:
• Better understand the data related to the aging workforce, as compared to myths and opinions
• Understand and apply ergonomics principles to accommodate the aging workforce
• Demonstrate ways to design for the aging population

Does your company suffer from having unclear roles and responsibilities, what about poor standard operating procedures or failure to get to the root cause of recurring and nagging problems? Do you have suppliers that introduce more problems and risk into your organization? These are common things that contribute to the risks organizations attempt to manage on a daily basis. Some do it well and others do not. Failure to get to the root cause of these problems may lead catastrophic results. This webinar presented by Oscar Combs, President and Senior Consultant of The ISO 9001 Group based in Houston, Texas will offer some solutions to common problems within organizations that often introduce risk, if they go unchecked. One powerful tool organization can use to assist in risk management is ISO 9001:2008. ISO 9001:2008 is a quality management system standard recognized and utilized globally by both product and service companies. More than one million organizations worldwide have implemented ISO 9001. Companies that choose to implement ISO 9001, do so to ensure that they have defined, effective and stable processes within their organization to assist them in reducing risk. It also provides the framework for employees when performing their jobs on a daily basis. The standard is based on a number of quality management principles including a strong customer focus, participation of top management, and continual improvement. Attendees of this webinar will learn how their organizations can reduce operational risks and associated expenses by implementing an ISO 9001 quality management system within their organizations.

Are you confused about OSHA’s record-keeping rules and procedures? Do you know the difference between an OSHA recordable injury and first aid only? What’s the difference between OSHA 300 recordable injuries and workers’ compensation claims reporting? This webinar presentation will cover this and much more. In addition, there will be a thought provoking practical exercise to assist attendees with applying the concepts to real life scenarios.
This topic is always a very popular subject. It will cover items such as OSHA recordable criteria; how to count lost days and restricted duty on an OSHA 300; what must be entered on an OSHA 300; why over-reporting on an OSHA 300 is a detriment to your organization; the differences between OSHA recording requirements and reporting an injury to a workers' compensation carrier, who must maintain a sharps injury log and why; the basic formula for an OSHA incident rate and what data is used in the calculation; and the regulations and the requirements for maintaining an OSHA 300 log. This presentation’s format is not merely a lecture; it is tailored in real time to the needs and suggestions of the attendees. Feedback is encouraged and necessary. Much of the presentation is spent addressing attendee’s scenarios that they have struggled with in their day to day operations. The scenarios presented within the presentation itself are designed to be fun, but at the same time, thought provoking.
This webinar is geared to the HR professional or any other person who may have safety and workers' compensation duties within an organization.

Under the current administration, federal regulatory agencies are being instructed to put more focus on enforcement action and less on consultative assistance. This means citations are going up, penalties are going up, the potential for criminal charges are going up, and you as the safety professional become the target!

Are you prepared for an inspection? Do you know what to do and not do when an inspector shows up at your door? Who should escort the inspector and what sort of information should you share with them? Not being prepared with the right answers can cause an OSHA inspection to cost you plenty of money in fines, not to mention the damage to your organization’s image and credibility.
This presentation will present some simple and effective steps that you can take to improve compliance and reduce the likelihood of fines, and will provide you with tools you can use right now to be prepared for an OSHA inspection.

Areas

Upon completion, participants should be able to:
•Develop an inspection plan to prepare for an OSHA inspection.
•Identify what sort of information to discuss with and OSHA inspector.
•Know what records an OSHA inspector will want to see.
•Identify the types of OSHA inspections.
•Avoid the common mistakes made during an OSHA inspection.
•Identify the phases of an OSHA inspection.

The GHS is an acronym for The Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labeling of Chemicals. The GHS is a system for standardizing and harmonizing the classification and labeling of chemicals. It is a logical and comprehensive approach to:

• Defining health, physical and environmental hazards of chemicals;
• Creating classification processes that use available data on chemicals for comparison with the defined hazard criteria; and
• Communicating hazard information, as well as protective measures, on labels and Safety Data Sheets (SDS).

Recent changes to how hazardous chemicals are classified and labeled and how those hazards are presented both on containers and on the relevant Safety Data Sheets that have also been modified. The changes are complex and are very different from the current hazard communication standard. In addition, due to the changes, other regulations (in addition to the hazard communication standard) are also impacted.

Many companies are already implementing the changes (ahead of regulatory deadlines) and, as a result, the newly classified and labeled chemicals may already be appearing in your workplace. Regardless of other companies, if your company receives, utilizes, stores or manufacturers hazardous chemicals, you have upcoming deadlines for implementation of the new requirements.

The GHS itself is not a regulation or standard. The GHS Document (referred to as the Purple Book) establishes agreed hazard classification and communication provisions with explanatory information on how to apply the system

This brief presentation will discuss the recent and impending changes and will further point you in the direction for more critical information to allow for a smooth, effective and compliant implementation of the Globally Harmonized System for Classification & Labeling of Chemicals!

The core message is that quality in production and all human activity is obtained by asking questions about any possibly errors in the products and by solving them systematically by use of the best evidence. These principles are shared in health research with the Evidence Based Medicine (EBM) principles in parallel with the ISO9000 etc. for industrial product quality. The methods share the basic logical structure (see for example SixSigma). The core issues include evidence based risk-assessment, management, evaluation and control/ surveillance.
The subject is risk prevention and the intention is to learn how research is a core element of the occupational risk prevention. To raise questions about the risks and to answer them is a core part of risk prevention when new risks are turning up continuously. Research is an organized way to ask questions and to find the answers. The basic elements in research is critical and systematically thinking and to be open for questions. The same way of thinking is needed to produce the best quality of the products. So risk prevention is more and more included as a natural part of high quality work and products. The question WHY health research is relevant for all areas of the human resource is because all industries want high quality production. This high quality production is depending of high quality work which again is depending on high quality of health and safety. None of the objectives can be reached without research and the use of scientific health evidence.

In the twenty first century, technology is utilized by over 90% of the work force. Multiple hours every day is required for many at a desk in front of a computer, laptop or other electronic devices. Loss of income, decreased work performance due to sprain and strains in back neck and wrist have proven to be a great contributory factor. Symptoms can include muscle pain and spasms in neck, shoulders with possible tingling and numbness in arm from extended periods of phone use. Positioning is a key component to many disorders. Making the work space fit your postural alignment and not your body fit whatever work space present is one of the key components to health and wellbeing.

Occupational injury and illness incidents in health care and social assistance have been known to account for 1 out of 5 incidents in the private industry. Improve your posture and prevent the pain and strain of all day working with these simple tips that can be applied immediately. Education on the movements that can cause discomfort or pain and recommended strategies to use can prevent further issues from arising and relieving some present symptoms. There are adaptations for work environments and personal work space as well as equipment to complete tasks and not lose efficiency. The key component is safety. The goal is to maintain efficiency and prevent injury from developing when long periods of repetitive type movements have to be performed. By implementing simple techniques with education, fewer complaints can be the result.