Definitions

North Seattle Community College has created a Back Care Safety Program to ensure that factors that contribute to the potential for injury are controlled, reduced or minimized. While no one approach has been foundf or totally eliminating back injuries, a back care program can minimize their occurrence by identifying back injury risk factors and developing means of reducing their impact. Let's look at some definitions and abbreviations before we get into the specifics of the program:

Abbreviations

NIOSH: The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health

OSHA: Occupational Safety and Health Administration

BLS: Bureau of Labor Statistics

CDC: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

IAP: Intra-Abdominal Pressure

Definitions

NIOSH believes that most effective way to prevent back injury is to implement an ergonomics program that focuses on redesigning the work invironment and work tasks to reduce the hazards of lifting.

In recent years, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of workers who rely on back belts, also called "back supports" or "abdominal belts," to prevent injury during lifting.

Lifting may produce a variety of forces within the body which contribute to a pressure on the spine, termed "loading."

Back belts were initially used in medical settings. These belts, termed "orthoses," resemble the corsets worn by women in the nineteenth century and are typically used to provide additional back support during rehabilitation if an injury has occured.

The industrial back belt, the typical abdominal support used in workplaces today is a lightweight, elastic belt worn around the lower back, sometimes held in place with suspenders.

Many times the item you are moving could be moved with a piece of equipment -

  • A dolly, a low mobile platform that rolls on casters, used for transporting heavy loads.
  • A hand truck, a two-wheeled cart for moving heavy objects by hand, consisting of a vertical framework with handles at the top and a metal blade at the bottom that is inserted beneath a load, the entire assembly being tilted backward until balanced for easy pushing or pulling.
  • A forklift, a small industrial vehicle with a power-operated pronged platform that can be raised and lowered for insertion under a load to be lifted and moved.

    • Consider using mechanical help wherever and whenever possible.



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