Strains and Slips and Sprains and Trips — Oh My!

• By Robert Pater
• Mar 01, 2024

Want a good way to harness moving from bad trailing to better leading? Utilize recent statistical analysis to wake and shake up your organization to make better moves towards higher level Safety performance.

While you might be familiar with Liberty Mutual Business Insurance’s annual Workplace Safety Index, which “compiles the top 10 causes of the most serious disabling workplace injuries,” are you also aware of the Travelers Insurance 2023 Injury Impact Report? This latter document analyzed more than 1.2 million workers compensation claims submitted from 2016 through 2020. The data is based on lost time claims from those accident years.”

Reported results, according to Rich Ives, Travelers’ Vice-President of Workers Compensation Claims: “The Injury Impact Report also looked at some of the most common causes of injury, with overexertion taking the top spot (29 percent of claims analyzed), which could include strains or injuries resulting from twisting, reaching, lifting or jumping. The second most frequent were slips, trips and falls (23 percent), followed by being struck by an object (13 percent), motor vehicle accidents (5 percent), and caught-in or caught-between hazards (5 percent).”

It is no surprise that both Liberty and Travelers’ concurred that soft-tissue injuries and slips, trips and falls far and away continue to lead the league in Safety problems. But rather than being a wake-up call for some leaders, this can actually turn into a lull-inducing “no big deal.” When a problem has existed over a long period of time — and when leaders believe they’ve already “tried everything” — it can be easy to become complacent, to think there’s nothing that can be done to really move the needle, that it’s a regrettably (unhappy) fact of life that these problems are inevitable and unfixable.

And then to effectively give up on trying to really make a difference. To default to doing the same things (or basically minor variations on what’s been tried) that haven’t really/sustainably reduced these injuries, to write them off as “a cost of doing business,” to attempt to over-rely on basically “willpower” methods to cut these injuries (making corporate pledges, appealing to “reason,” motivating through rewards or punishment, etc.) or to even blame workers or Safety leaders out of frustration. Seen it, time and again. Yet soft-tissue injuries and slips/trips/falls still prevail.

Napoleon Bonaparte said, “A leader is a dealer in hope.” Well, I’m here to offer some real hope: significant improvements are possible with both of these injuries. By first changing our perspective, then other company leaders’ perspective, and then workers’ perspective. That real step-ups in Safety performance are possible — and that other companies have accomplished these. And if they could do it, why can’t you? It starts with upgrading at least five viewpoints:

1. Both of these injury “types” affect all kinds of workers — and in all sectors — as well as worldwide (specifically, we’ve heard from numerous global Safety leaders that they believe slips/trips/falls are greatly under-reported in sites outside of North America, whether due to cultural or other factors.) When I say “all kinds of workers,” I’m including senior Executives. Anyone who pushes, pulls, lifts, carries, uses tools or luggage, etc., can be prone to strains or sprains, and anyone who walks, runs, climbs stairs, etc., is exposed to potential slips, trips and falls.

2. Both are related, with common contributors. Specifically, physical balance and mental attention. Experience also shows that it is highly possible to positively affect both soft-tissue injuries and slips, trips, and falls by upgrading actual balance and attention skills.

3. Both can — and do — either build or occur off-work as well as on; they aren’t just work-related. And that addressing off-work exposures and prevention skills can accomplish three things: positively motivate those who otherwise may be resistant to making at-work safety improvements; help build safer default habits that are effective at work and at home; and head off some cumulative effects that can add towards triggering an incident.

4. While both are affected by external and personal/internal factors that can lead to injury, it’s impossible to eliminate all the external forces (exposure to elements, changing surfaces, moving loads, etc.) Further, this is the arena most companies have already tried to address, some almost exclusively. I absolutely believe that the first step in Safety is to reduce or eliminate potential risks, either through design, policies and procedures, etc.

But there’s only so much that can be done with these injury sources (diminishing returns?) For sure, continue to reduce risks, but don’t attempt to do so exclusively. It’s also critical to transfer those “individual” mental and physical skills necessary to help people prevent these injuries. Portable, so they can take them along and call on these wherever they encounter risks, so that they can avoid those sources and reduce injury.

5. That is because these contributors are often “small” and below the radar of awareness. However, the good news is that similarly, “small” adjustments, rather than major energy-draining changes, have been shown to result in significant improvements in reducing these injuries.

From our more than three decades of experience in this arena, I know it’s not only possible but proven that when companies that previously thought they’d “done everything possible” do recalibrate their Safety mindset, then follow through with imparting necessary baseline mental and physical skillsets, they have achieved significant and sustained improvements in reducing the incidence and severity of strain and sprains and slips and trips and falls. Indeed, “Oh My!” 

This article originally appeared in the February/March 2024 issue of Occupational Health & Safety.