An estimated 2,000 eye injuries happen every day in workplaces across the United States. According to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, workplace eye injuries have a yearly cost of $300 million in lost production time, medical expenses and workers’ compensation costs.

What to watch out for

Nearly 70 percent of eye-related accidents result from flying and falling objects or sparks striking the eye. Particles such as dust, cement chips, metal slivers and wood chips can be sent flying following the use of a tool, or else can be blown into the eye by the wind or fall from above a worker.

Other dangers include penetration from sharp objects, such as nails, staples or slivers of wood, and exposure to chemicals.

Before removing eye protection, brush any particles out of your hair and eyebrows that may have gotten trapped while you were performing the job.

It’s also important to maintain your eyewear. Dirt and scratches can reduce vision, cause glare and may not offer full protection.

What eyewear should you use?

There are several kinds of eyewear that offer different protection. Make sure to use eyewear that is appropriate for the job:

• Side shields are required when there are flying particles
• Face shields are required when grinding, welding or removing slag
• Splash goggles or face shields are required when pouring chemicals

Over-the-glasses eye protection is available for workers who wear glasses.

Emergency eyewash stations

All employees should be aware of the location of emergency eyewash stations. If your eyes come into contact with foreign particles or chemicals, immediately use an eyewash station.

To use the eyewash station, active the flow and being to flush the eyes out with water. Use your fingers to keep your eyes open as wide as possible, but only if your hands are clean. If they aren’t, have a co-worker hold your eyes open for you. Roll your eyes as much as possible to remove loose particles or wash chemicals from under the eyelids. Rinse off your face as well.

It will feel uncomfortable, but it’s important to flush the eyes for the recommended amount of time, generally between 15 and 30 minutes. After you finish, notify your supervisor and seek medical attention.

Pay attention to any chemicals you may use while working. The Material Safety Data Sheet will list which chemicals may cause irritation, burns, corneal damage or blindness. Container labels or tags will warn for chemical burns or state that the material is corrosive, caustic or toxic.

While it’s important to know how to use an eyewash station, remember that the best way to prevent damage is to use protective eyewear. Approximately 90 percent of injuries are preventable with the use of proper eye safety.

By Lee Wendel, CSP, CSPHA, SFM Loss Prevention Technical Leader

We know you’re busy managing your teams and operations every day. This might include keeping workers safe from exposure to dangerous materials. One area that we know can present consistent challenges is the rigorous compliance standards for proper management of hazardous chemicals in the workplace.

OSHA reports that over 43 million American workers are exposed to hazardous chemicals on the job every year. From a regulatory compliance standpoint, the OSHA Hazard Communication Standard (HazCom) can be difficult to manage without some help. We know that the effort is worth it because some of the injuries that we see from chemical exposure can be life-changing.

One recent example of such an incident came from a school district insured by SFM.

During the summer, an employee was cleaning lockers using a solvent designed to remove graffiti and other marks. The product’s label contained warnings about health hazards, but the employee did not adhere to them. The worker was wearing gloves but did not use the recommended ventilation or respiratory equipment. As a result of the exposure, this individual experienced dizziness, breathing difficulty and a body-wide tingling sensation — ultimately requiring hospitalization via ambulance.

To make such risks more manageable, SFM has identified a vendor that offers valuable tools that facilitate compliance with industrial hygiene standards. Through a partnership with SFM, Velocity EHS has made its MSDSonline product available to our policyholders at a discount.

Their solution includes:

• Safety Data Sheet compliance
  The solution has an SDS database that is constantly updated, giving you confidence that you always have the most up-to-date information about the chemicals your teams use.
• Right To Know compliance
  A solution is available that works across multiple platforms, including mobile devices, and provides 24/7 access to critical information.
• Secondary container labels
  Simplifies the labeling process for each hazardous chemical that is dispensed into smaller containers. Labeling includes all required elements and pictograms including the PPE (Personal Protective Equipment) that must be worn while using the chemical.

If you are interested in learning more about MSDSonline, review the industrial hygiene listings on the safety products and vendors page.

It’s more dangerous to work in a hospital than to construct one.

That’s according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics data on non-fatal injuries by occupation.

Although construction has a reputation as a high-risk industry, workers in hospitals and nursing homes have higher injury rates than workers in manufacturing, construction or logging.

See the chart below for the comparison of injury rates by occupation.

Who is being injured?

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics 2017 incident rates for non-fatal injuries per 10,000 full-time workers.

How are health care workers being injured?

In its February 2018 Work Comp newsletter , the Minnesota Department of Labor and Industry reported on the sources of injuries in Minnesota hospitals in 2016:

• Nearly 60 percent due to overexertion
• Nearly 20 percent due to slips, trips and falls
• Nearly 10 percent due to violence

Thirty percent of the injuries directly involved a hospital patient. Of those injuries involving a patient, the majority were due to overexertion while lifting or moving a patient.

The second most common cause was intentional or unintentional violence by the patient. Health care workers face some of the greatest risk for workplace violence. See our De-escalation Team Training – health care resource for information on de-escalation tactics in health care settings.

Strains and sprains account for more than half of all health care injuries reported to SFM. Many strain and sprain injuries occur while manually lifting and transferring patients. Fractures and contusions made up 19 percent of injuries, and punctures and lacerations were another 17 percent.

See the chart for the types of injuries sustained by health care workers.

Source: SFM 2007-2016 health care policyholders claim data.

Some groups at more risk

Nursing home workers and other types of health care professionals have higher injury rates. Home health care workers face additional challenges due to their unique working environment.

Safety in health care faces another challenge due to an aging workforce. The U.S. Department of Labor reports that the average nurse is now older than 50 years old.

When health care workers over the age of 40 are injured, their claim is 76 percent more likely to be an expensive lost-time claim, where they are unable to return to work quickly. Older workers are at high risk for serious injuries due to lost muscle strength and other factors. Their more severe injuries and slower recovery times result in claim costs 2.4 times higher than for younger workers.

For more data and tips on how to reduce lifting injuries, download our occupational injuries in health care fact sheet .

We asked SFM’s loss prevention representatives what we’d find in the winter emergency kits they keep in their cars in case of roadside emergencies.

Their safety kits include:

• Magnetized emergency flashers you can stick on the car
• Fleece hats, scarves and mittens
• Tow ropes
• A blanket, such as a Mylar emergency blanket
• First aid supplies
• Hand and foot warmers
• Matches and candles
• A whistle
• A flashlight and spare batteries
• Warm boots
• High visibility vest
• Shovel
• A lithium battery jump starter, which can also charge cell phones and provide light
• Packaged snacks such as nuts and granola bars
• A snow suit
• Road flares and warning triangles
• Chemical light sticks
• Traction footwear

Follow these other winter driving safety tips for more advice.

Looking for an easy, inexpensive way to prevent injuries in your workplace? Consider replacing old manually retractable and fixed-blade utility knives with a concealed blade version.

They typically cost less than $3 a piece, and can prevent serious lacerations. As a side benefit, they also help prevent damage to the contents of boxes.

You can purchase these types of knives through Martor , Uline and many other retailers.

When it’s snowy and icy outside, it takes the right moves to avoid a winter slip-and-fall injury in a parking lot. Show your employees this lighthearted video to remind them how to walk safely in slippery conditions.

Avoid winter slips and falls: Icy parking lot safety

For more winter prevention resources and information, visit SFM’s winter slip and fall prevention page.

What do Midwesterners dread most about nasty winter weather? Driving in it.

Getting across town during a snow or ice storm can be stressful, time-consuming and dangerous.

What can you as an employer do to keep your employees safe and your organization functioning when dangerously bad weather hits?

There’s not always an easy answer, but the first step is to have a plan.

Why you need a severe winter weather policy

A severe weather policy is a critical component of your business’s overall emergency preparedness and disaster recovery plan.

It’s not uncommon for state departments of transportation to advise against travel due to severe weather. Whether it’s poor visibility or ice, unsafe road conditions could keep your employees from the office.

Schools have decades of experience in communicating closures to keep staff and students out of treacherous weather conditions. They’ve established clear plans on who makes the decision to close, by what time, and how to notify people.

But calling a snow day isn’t just for schools.

It’s essential for employers of all types to be prepared for a disruption to normal business operations because of severe weather. Of course, not everyone can shut down during inclement weather. Hospitals, for example, need to be staffed 24/7. You may have critical operations to keep running.

How can you get prepared? With a snow day policy.

Before the snow flies: Develop a snow day policy

The time to plan for bad weather is before a storm hits. Employees will have many questions that should be addressed in an inclement weather policy, like in this example policy .

“The inclement weather policy must set expectations, present a balanced approach to compensation, mitigate risks for both employers and employees, and present a fair solution for emergency situations,” writes Susan Heathfield .

Eight items to consider covering in your snow policy

Following are items you should think about covering in your inclement weather policy:

• How you will communicate a closure to employees — phone call, text, email, broadcasting system, etc.
• Your expectation that employees use caution while entering and leaving work in poor weather conditions
• Your intention to monitor the weather forecast, as well as any specific conditions that will trigger a closure (snowfall amount, temperature, electrical outage, loss of heat, declaration of weather emergency, etc.)
• Instructions that traveling employees are not to drive in unsafe conditions, as well as a reminder of your prohibition of cell phone use while driving
• Expectations about what happens in the event of closure, such as whether employees should work from home
• Compensation in the event of a severe weather scenario, keeping in mind local, state and federal laws
• How you will notify customers, clients or vendors of a closure — notice on your website, voicemail message, email, etc.
• The expectation in the event of a mid-day closure that employees are expected to leave immediately

Let’s look at a few of these items in more detail.

How to define a weather emergency

When developing your plan, consider setting specific criteria about the amount of snowfall, road conditions and temperatures that may trigger a closure. This will keep your employees from wondering about a snow day each time the snowplows come out.

Blizzards aren’t the only weather situation that may require closing. Below-freezing temperatures and wind chills as low as -60 degrees prompted the governor of Minnesota to close schools statewide in January of 2014.

Rely on an expert like the National Weather Service for weather conditions and to your state’s department of transportation for road conditions. You may look to your local school district as a guide. Know the terminology for different winter weather alerts, advisories and warnings.

Expectations for employees

If you’ve set up the ability for workers to telecommute or work remotely, do you still expect employees to work if your office is closed due to weather? What if the company does not close, but an employee would prefer to avoid traveling? Remote work options could allow them to avoid taking a personal day.

As with other parts of your snow day plan, communicate clear expectations with your employees if you expect them to work remotely if they cannot make it into the office. Prepare your IT infrastructure for a spike in activity if many more employees than normal try to access the remote work system.

Your weather emergency plan also needs to factor in maintaining any business-critical operations. If a vital employee cannot make it to work, do you have a backup plan?

Compensation

Keep in mind the business implications of voluntarily closing because of the weather. Even if your employees aren’t working, they may still be due a paycheck. Check your state and federal regulations for rules around paying exempt and non-exempt employees in various bad weather scenarios .

By developing a snow day policy ahead of time, you’ll be prepared to make a thoughtful decision before a storm hits, and you’ll help your employees stay safe.

Key: Be proactive and build a strong safety culture

An inclement weather policy can formalize your stance on employee safety during winter weather conditions, but ultimately, employees must also make decisions about their own safety and use their best judgment about whether they should be driving.

That’s why it’s important to foster a workplace culture where employees know you care about their health and safety and wouldn’t punish them for prioritizing their safety over work.

In the same vein, you can be proactive by starting to plan as soon as you hear a big storm is coming. You can encourage employees to rearrange their schedules in advance to avoid driving during the worst of it. This might mean leaving a day early to get to an out-of-town meeting, doing a delivery early or simply rescheduling an offsite meeting.

Strategies like this can keep your organization functioning while also keeping your employees safe.

This is not intended to serve as legal advice for individual fact-specific legal cases or as a legal basis for your employment practices.

This post was originally published on January 18, 2017 and updated on November 7, 2018.