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The GAWDA Safety Committee identified "Hand and Finger Injuries"
as a high injury area within our membership, but with the potential for
substantial injury reduction. Therefore, the committee decided to make
this part of our Safety Plan for 2004 and established a committee to develop
recommendations that can lead to a reduction of these types of injuries.
The approach the committee took in addressing this task is:
- Provide some general educational information about hand and finger
injuries.
- Make specific suggestions on how to identify and control hazards
that can lead to hand and finger injuries.
- Identify some of the leading causes and control measures of these
injuries in our industry.
General Information
Hands and fingers are among the most frequently injured parts of the body.
When you think about how much we use our hands, it's not hard to understand
why injuries to the fingers and hands are common. That's because whatever
you're doing, your hands are on the front lines. The National Safety Council
reported that in a recent year, there were 530,000 disabling hand and
finger injuries. The average is about 500,000 per year. Nearly one out
of four on-the-job accidents involve these parts of the body.
To help reduce these injuries, it's important for employees to learn
about the most common hazards to these body parts. Paying a little more
attention to your hands and the surrounding work area could have prevented
most of these injuries. Almost any thing in the workplace can be a hand
hazard: hand or power tools, chemicals, scrap, fire and all material
handling activities. But keep in mind that about 80% of these injuries
are caused by pinch points, which have a nasty habit of catching us when
we aren't looking or paying attention. The following are some of the basic
precautions that can be taken to protect your hands and fingers.
| Basic Protections |
- Always wear gloves when changing blades in label scrapers.
- Scrape cylinder labels away from your body.
- Always cut away from your body.
- Use brushes, not hands, to sweep up metal or wood chips.
- Check materials for sharp edges, burrs, splinters, etc. before
handling them.
- Wipe off greasy or slippery objects before handling them.
- Make sure doorways are clear and aisles are wide enough when
moving materials manually.
- Lift the object so your hands are not near the pinch point.
- Keep fingers on the sides, not the top or bottom, of spacers
when you're stacking material.
- Put materials down carefully so you don't mash your fingers.
- Use the right tool for the job and use it correctly.
- Store tools so no sharp edges are exposed.
- Pass - don't throw - tools to other workers, handle first.
- Follow manufacturer's instructions for proper use of tools and
equipment.
- Feed material into moving machinery with a push stick, not your
hands.
- Keep your hands away from moving machine parts.
- Make sure you know how hot or cold an object is before handling
it.
- Do not use a pocketknife as a tool.
- Wear proper gloves for any tasks that are not delicate or do
not have a risk of getting the glove caught in moving machine
parts.
- Select gloves to protect against the job's specific hazards.
- Use material safety data sheets to determine what gloves you
need for chemical protection.
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Guards are your best protection from getting your hands or fingers caught
and injured by tools and machines. It's up to each employee and the company
to make sure that every tool or piece of equipment has the proper guards.
It's up to you to see that the guards stay in place and to make sure the
guards are working right. Otherwise, don't use the tool.
Identifying and Controlling Hazards
One approach to identifying the hazards (a condition or practice with
the potential to cause hand and finger injury) is to conduct a risk assessment
where not only you identify the hazards, but you determine the level of
risk for that hazard (the likelihood of that hazard causing a hand or
finger injury) and then determining the preventive measures needed to
eliminate/reduce the risk to an acceptable level.
The following are two examples of how this process works.
Example 1 — During your risk assessment, you identify that
employees are using their pocketknife in a variety of ways as a tool.
This is the hazard. Next you determine the likelihood of that hazard causing
a hand or finger injury; then you determine the preventive measures that
you must take to eliminate or reduce the risk of injury by using a pocketknife
as a tool.
Example 2 — During your risk assessment, you identify that
congestion and tight quarters, because of large numbers of full and empty
cylinders, in the fill plant and on the docks have resulted in narrow
work areas for moving cylinders. The hazard is narrow work areas for moving
cylinders because of congestion. Next you determine the likelihood of
pinch point type hand and finger injuries while moving cylinders through
narrow work areas because of the congestion and tight quarters. Then you
determine the appropriate preventive measures that must be taken to eliminate
or reduce the risk of injury because of the limited space for moving cylinders.
Do you have clear designated aisles that are wide enough that cylinders
can be moved safely with the proper hand clearance?
This process will work for you and make it easier to identify and understand
how injuries (hand and finger) in this particular case can happen, what
is the likelihood, and what are the appropriate control measures to reduce
or eliminate the risk.
A risk assessment may require different preventive measures to get to
the best resolution for eliminating/reducing the risk of injury or loss
to an acceptable level. These are some of the preventive measure techniques
that you may want to consider:
- Engineering Controls — Your risk assessment may determine,
for example, that you should modify the design of the workstation by
moving the cylinders closer to the area of filling; or have a different
design of cylinder cart that is more user friendly; or redesign tools
or replace existing tools that better meet the needs of the employee
and the task being performed; or provide tools with a selection of handle
sizes so that each employee can be properly fitted with the right tool
size.
- Work Practice Control — Another preventive measure may
be a change in how the task is performed. Your risk assessment may conclude,
for example, that cylinders should not be rolled, but moved by cylinder
carts if the cylinder movement is more than 10 feet.
- Safety Training and Management Coaching — Proper training
and good management follow and coaching are critical to a successful
safety program. Your risk assessment may determine that the employees
were not properly trained to avoid hand and finger injuries related
to our industry. Management follow up in the form of employee observations
and audits for compliance are necessary to ensure employees understand
what is required and why it is necessary to follow established safety
rules and prescribed work practices
Causes and Controls of Hand and Finger Injuries
in our Industry
In a separate document, the committee has produced what they believe are
the leading causes of hand and finger injuries within our membership.
The document also identifies control measures that can eliminate or reduce
the risk of injury to the hands and fingers, if effectively implemented.
This document can be used in conjunction with the above information as
a training tool to promote hand and finger safety in the workplace. The
document has been limited to one page for easy reference as a hand out,
payroll stuffer and bulletin board posting.
There are many options on how you may best use this information. You
may want to develop a campaign to "Reduce Hand and Finger Injuries"
or develop some type of Safety Awards program around hand and finger injury
reduction. Another option is to make a three-part safety meeting/training
program from the material. Based on your company size, the number of injuries
sustained to the hand and fingers, resources, etc. will determine how
you elect to treat this material.
The committee hopes that you find this material and these recommendations
helpful.
| GAWDA Safety Committee Members |
- Greg Barnett
- Tom Eynon
- Ed Henne
- Fred Schreckengost
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