Caster Technology
Healthcare workers are dedicated providers of care for people in need around the globe. Unfortunately, in the course of their jobs, they are exposed to a variety of risks and hazards ranging from hazardous materials to work-related musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs).
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, healthcare worker injuries are a serious issue to be addressed.
…employees in nursing and personal care facilities suffer over 200,000 work-related injuries and illnesses a year. Many of these are serious injuries. More than half require time away from work. Worker's compensation costs for the industry now amount to nearly $1 billion per year. Workers in nursing homes are 2x as likely as other workers to be injured on the job.
United States Department of Labor – Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA)
Given their commitment to the well-being of their patients, it’s all that more important that they are provided with protection from injuries. While not all injuries are unavoidable, there are methods of reducing risk of injury to these valuable healthcare providers.
Read on for Healthcare Ergonomics Best Practices and Resources...
When designing industrial carts for manual material handling (MMH), a primary goal of an industrial ergonomist is to reduce the risk of musculoskeletal injuries by keeping the forces required to start, stop and maneuver the cart within recommended safe limits.
There are many facets of industrial cart design to consider to keeping cart operating forces within recommended limits – we’ll focus on the two many aspects.
Industrial cart handle placement and caster selection/placement are crucial to support industrial ergonomics and reduce workplace injuries.
MHI Solutions Magazine recently published an article written by Jean Feingold which focused on ergonomic industrial cart and caster solutions. The article highlights some often overlooked cart and caster ergonomic considerations in the manual material handling industry.
Feingold interviewed some leaders in the field of industrial ergonomics including Terry Parmelee of Kinetic Technologies and Lui Dilauro of Darcor Limited,
Read on to check out the highlights and read the complete article.
AEC 2018 Highlights Include the ROI of Ergonomics, Creative Improvements to Support Workplace Ergonomics and a Closer Look at Push Pull Guidelines
The team from Darcor recently returned from the 2018 Applied Ergo Conference (AEC) in late March in Atlanta. As always, the AEC brought together the greatest minds in the field of ergonomics. These ergonomists and engineers attend the AEC to get the opportunity to cross-pollinate ideas, policies, technologies, advancements in the field of ergonomics.
The 2018 AEC was no exception with booths, presentations, exhibits, success stories and the Ergo Cup® Awards all serving the purpose of advancing ergonomics to support reduction in injuries.
Read on to find out about ergonomic trends, Ergo Cup awards, and presentation highlights from AEC 2018
Manual material handling using carts is a prime example of an occupational push and pull task. Managing the risk associated with pushing, pulling and maneuvering carts in the workplace is a critical component of an industrial ergonomics program.
As most facilities or organizations have fleets of carts, a systematic approach is useful in managing and reducing the risks associated with cart handling. While such a system will vary to suit the idiosyncrasies of different operations, there are some common components to these ergonomics cart management programs.
So, what are some best practices for cart ergonomics?
To understand the importance of using the right casters on medical equipment in a healthcare environment, let us examine a scene in an archetypal hospital where patients, carts and sensitive equipment are constantly ushered to various rooms, crossing multiple floors and possibly traveling long distance. Since the environment is in flux, it is imperative to consider the performance and failure rates of casters when evaluating the design of medical equipment both using original casters and replacement casters.
Since casters need to constantly perform at their peak and be durable to create a positive impact on ROI, the logical next step is to examine how to identify the right casters for intended applications. Here are a few key points to consider:
Just as there are safe operating envelopes for aircraft, there are safe operating envelopes for pushing and pulling carts. Just as for aircraft, the strength and endurance capabilities of the human operator play an important role in determining the safe operating envelopes for carts. Operating forces that stress the operator beyond their limits are outside the safe operating envelope. Consequently, measuring the forces exerted by the cart operator and comparing those forces to known operator limits is the basis for determining a safe operating envelope.
What is the Value of Productivity in Your Operations?
Continuous improvement and lean manufacturing are top-of-mind with manufacturing and distribution organizations worldwide. The concept is that incremental changes can result in major cost wins for the organization.
In a recent real-life client test scenario, high quality casters proved to be effective in increasing worker productivity by 10%. When factoring in wage costs of workers, this translates to significant productivity improvement related cost savings.
For organizations that rely heavily on wheeled equipment in their day-to-day operations, the purchasing department is tasked with making purchasing decisions that impact the design and handling of equipment. The purchasing department’s main goal is to minimize purchasing costs. This goal can be in direct opposition of other departmental goals. It’s important to remember that a solution that has a low up-front cost is not going to give the long-term, maintenance-free performance and ergonomic benefits of a higher quality, better engineered and therefore more expensive product.
The automotive industry is one of the biggest players in providing ergonomic mandates for their plant employees. Many automotive manufacturing companies use existing health and safety standards, such as OSHA, to develop their own set of guidelines.
In an automotive plant, there are many tasks that require the right kind of posture or equipment to handle or transport product in order to keep employees safe and healthy.
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