March 12, 2010
Did you know...?
Risk Reduction Through Early Symptom Recognition
Overuse injuries (repetitive stress injuries - RSI’s or repetitive stress disorders – RSD’s) are costly to businesses in all sectors. Because of the costly impact of RSI’s to both workers and employers, workplace safety programs often are developed to minimize their occurrence and severity. These programs often focus on environmental and ergonomic factors, awareness and education. Too often, education in the form of early symptom recognition is overlooked.
Many workers disregard sensations of discomfort and discount the potential impact the discomfort will have if left unchecked. There are many reasons employees may be quick to dismiss pain or to delay bringing attention to these symptoms: Stoicism about being in pain – “just grin and bear it”; Concern about becoming a liability to the employer; The association of pain with being “part of getting older”; Belief that pain will eventually go away on its own; Thinking that pain is just part of working hard. Consequently, employees will often delay seeking solutions for symptoms until it’s too late. The result is that a relatively minor ache or pain develops into a costly RSI. Safety efforts put toward prevention of overuse injuries must have a focus on both awareness and education as they relate to early symptom recognition.
Because pain is such a subjective experience, education on early symptom recognition needs to be:
· Joint specific – the sensation of pain in one body part will often present differently than it does in another so it’s important for employees to be able to recognize how, for example, neck and upper back pain will feel and manifest differently than pain at the elbow or knee.
· Condition specific – employees need to know which symptoms occur and where anatomically. When an employee recognizes specific symptoms occurring such as for epicondylitis - “tennis elbow” – and has knowledge of what type of condition these symptoms may represent they are more likely to seek solutions for the condition.
· Task specific – identifying troublesome workstations and job tasks is a necessity as much as identifying the types of pain patterns and specific joints that may be affected by the troublesome job tasks. With this knowledge there is better ability to bring awareness to employees about which job tasks tend to contribute to specific symptoms for specific joints. Resources for educating employees on “task specific” early symptom recognition include occupational medical staff, health staff, local health professionals such as physical therapists, sports medicine physicians, etc.
The roles of education and awareness in early symptom recognition work best when coupled with an effective first reporting system (employees pro-actively alert their supervisors, company medical staff, etc when they recognize symptoms early on that are associated with performing certain job tasks). By working together, solutions for both the employee’s symptoms and for the job tasks that contributed to the onset of symptoms can be sought before the employee’s pains develop in to a costly Repetitive Stress Injury.
Early symptom recognition is an integral part of a risk reduction and overuse injury prevention program.
To learn more about how Rehabilitation Specialists… a division of OHS-COMPCARE… can help your company develop a risk reduction and overuse injury prevention program please contact our Client Services Team at (816) 561-2105 option 1 or by e-mail at customerservice@ohscompcare.com.
***We are now open Saturdays at our Independence location from 9am – 1pm to serve your occupational medicine and urgent care needs. Our Independence location is open 5pm – 9pm Monday – Friday to serve your after hour needs as well***
*Please feel free to forward this information to any member of management in your company who would benefit from it.*
To view the Tip of the Week in Spanish please visit our Tip of the Week library at http://www.ohscompcare.com/totw/.
To learn more about
services OHS-COMPCARE has to offer, contact our Client Services
Team at (816) 561-2105 option 1 or by e-mail at customerservice@ohscompcare.com. You can also visit us at www.ohscompcare.com.
Why choose us? Because OHS-COMPCARE has a physician on call 24/7/365 days a year to respond to our client's needs.
OHS-COMPCARE now featuring Adult Quick Care (Urgent Care Services) has seven (7) area clinical facilities:
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Independence Clinical Facility |
Johnson County Clinical Facility |
St. Joseph Clinical Facility |
Grandview Clinical Facility |
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19000 E. Eastland Center Crt, St. 200 |
10415 Lackman Road |
904 Edmond Street |
13830 S Us Highway 71 |
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Independence, MO 64055 |
Lenexa, KS 66219 |
St. Joseph, MO 64501 |
Grandview, MO 64030 |
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816-478-9299 |
913-495-9905 |
816-233-7702 |
816-761-4664 |
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After Hours Available *Now open Saturday 9am – 1pm |
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KCMO/Broadway Clinical Facility |
KCMO/Front Street Clinical Facility |
Wyandotte County Clinical Facility |
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1650 Broadway |
6501 East Commerce, Suite 110 |
1333 Meadowlark Lane, Suite 200 |
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Kansas City, MO 64108 |
Kansas City, MO 64120 |
Kansas City, KS 66102 |
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816-842-2020 |
816-483-5550 |
913-596-2774 |
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Adult Quick Care provides Urgent Care to Adults and Adolescents Age 14 and Older.
No appointment is necessary at Adult Quick Care.
When you are sick or have a new injury, Adult Quick Care is your affordable, time saving choice for quality care.
To learn more about Adult Quick Care please call 816-559-6320 or visit www.adultquickcare.com.