Slip Trip Fall CLT PDF
Preview Slip Trip Fall CLT
SLIP TRIP FALL……….@&%)!!... A Few Four Letter Words You Don’t Want to Hear William M. Montante, CSP, CXLT Senior Consultant [email protected] Atlanta, GA Charlotte Safety School April 4, 2013 My Thanks to Shanna Caviness for the invitation and for recommending the title. It gave me a new theme on which to build the massage that slips/falls are inevitable, rare events that we can manage and influence both in frequency and severity. 0 Scope • A BIT OF PHILOSOPHY.. A BIT OF SCIENCE AND A BUNCH OF PRACTICAL GUIDANCE ON – Reality of STF – Embracing the complexity – Impact – Mechanics – How to influence probability – What is a safe floor? – Standards – Tribometers – STF terminology – Exposures/Controls; stairs, mats – How not to get tripped up by vendors – Resources MARSH 1 I’ll be moving quickly thru these main points, focusing a bit on philosophy surrounding human walking….you become more of a philosopher as you age and have history on which you can reflect how things fit together, what works and what does not. I will cover of bit of the mechanics of human ambulation and what helps up maintain an upright posture. The bulk of this discussion will be practical guidance to adress the major risk factors 1 Don’t cuss in a canyon, you might not like the response…….. @&%) too!... @&%)! MARSH 2 MY thanks ro Shanna for the title. It trigger many ideas. Such as this witticism….but also this supposed Chinese proverb….”It is better to light one candle than to curse the darkness…So, I took that as my guide into this message. .It is my small way of shedding some light on what seems to be a dark and certainly complex problem of STF. It is not something to curse at but to appreciate the positive message that for the most part, walking a stable process and slips/fall are very rare events when looked at on a grander systems perspective 2 Darkness or Light…..Myth or Reality? “The human organism is basically unstable; because mankind has not evolved sufficiently from a quadrupedal configuration, and in ambulation people are constantly walking in a state of controlled fall.” Carlsoo, Streindler, 1955 “We do walk all the time, so why can’t we walk without falling? It’s a great challenge to understand.” Insurance Carrier Loss Control Advisory Services “Shadows of the Neanderthal”–permission to reprint from Pegasus Communications MARSH 3 A bit of historical reflection. Researchers Carlsoo and Streindler in 1955 offered their rather narrow and negative opinion on human walking. It is somewhat true…only with respect that each step we take is a controlled response to falling. They are way off the mark in their understanding of the evolution of human ambulation. Yet that lack of understanding prevails….(read quote)…recently an insurance carrier loss control rep stated….this is troubling coming from a company whose is a leader in risk research. Contrary to his opinion, we do have a very good understanding of how humans walk and remain upright, and we know what needs to be done to control (if that term is accurate) perhaps better toi use the term influence, frequency and severity. What is difficult in the effort is understanding the complexity and how the many variables fit together to cause slips/falls 3 There is always a price to pay……… MARSH 4 I use this image not to offend or reinforce thinking on the evolution of humankind, but to make an important point that there is always a price to pay, a tradeoff, no free lunch….When a structure, for whatever reason or process, moves its center of mass three feet above the ground and balances on two small narrow platforms, the potential for toppling over or some other way of upsetting, increases significantly compared to a quadrapedal form of motion. Horses fall over…it is not just a phenomenon of bipedalism…We’ve evolved a long way….it is quite amazing what we can accomplish on two feet…. 4 MARSH 5 Despite the many factors conspiring to take us down, we do quite well on two feet 5 @%($*&(@!_Happens! MARSH 6 But when those factors, singly or more often in combination with the laws of physics and mechanics, are present in a context, the probability of slipping tripping or falling rise. 6 Reality Check – Prevention…Control or Influence?...... (cid:1)STF - Always have…always will… (cid:1)Global phenomenon (cid:1)STF toll (cid:1)Worsening trend (cid:1)Rare events, under-reported (cid:1)Linked with manual handling (cid:1)Opportunist (cid:1)Causation is complex; multi-factored (cid:1)Systems perspective MARSH 7 You can find just about any statistic you want on STF. Regardless, the problem is big and getting worse. Not just here but globally. Top 5 sources of injury and costs; top 2 in some industries 15% -40% of occupational injuries; 40-60% of GL 70-80% same level. Slips - 40-60% of the total by type Same surface falls cost $7 billion annually, second only to manual handling/strains.Typical - $4500 -$9000 per claim Global phenomenon and getting worse….baby boomers the 2007 Liberty Mutual Workplace Safety Index indicates that falls on the same level were the second leading cause of all workplace injuries in 2005, accounting for 13.6 percent of direct costs associated with such injuries, or more than US$6.6 billion. Additionally, the National Safety Council (NSC) estimates that workers’ compensation and medical costs associated with employee slip-and-fall accidents are approximately $70 billion per year. And Liberty Mutual cautions that the problem keeps growing with the costs associated with injuries that result from falls on the same level growing 25.6 percent between 1998 and 2005 Slip, trip and fall incidents in the workplace cost 40 workers their lives last year and cost society an estimated £800 million each year Rate of ~1 per every 300 FTE 7 MARSH 8 The last time I made this presentation it was at the NASCAR Hall of Fame and I used a race car analogy to human walking. The dynamics are different, but only in scale. 8 Complicated Machine + Human = Complex Adaptive System Desire Down to fly Force RF AF Center of Mass Gravity Required Friction > Available Friction Base of Support MARSH 9 A race car travels faster than the take off speed of a commercial airliner. Flying is not normal for ground based vehicles. But, as long as its aerodynamics combine with the forces of gravity and friction to keep its center of mass over its base of support, the vehicle can perform its designed function. Also critical is that the required friction must be greater than the available friction, otherwise, unpleasant things happen. Same holds true with humans 9
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