The State of Washington and NIOSH share the results of a symposium that brought together private insurance carriers, insurance associations, self-insured corporations, academic institutions and government agencies. The participants learned how Workers Compensation data can be used to estimate injury magnitude, severity, cost, frequency, and trends, which can then be used to prioritize prevention.

Researchers tested safe patient handling training methods, including classroom and contextual (hands-on) training in both emergency and non-emergency situations. Not surprisingly, they found that contextual training is more effective than classroom training, but what are the implications for ergonomists?

A survey based study of critical care nurses shows that most still manually perform patient lift and transfer tasks, creating a strikingly high level of workplace risk in relation to patient handling tasks. However, safe practices are followed when efective management characteristics are in place.

Who knew? The wholesale and retail trade sector, usually thought of as low risk industry, instead shows a higher rate of injury/illness and overexertion related disabling disorders than general private industry, according to this NIOSH analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics data.