Back strains are common where heavy lifting is part of your job. It is important that you take care of your back but equally important that you employer takes necessary steps too.
Common problems
It is not only what is carried which can cause injuries but the way in which something is carried. Twisting and bending to pick up or poor posture when carrying objects can strain your back and damage muscles or plates.
Duties of Employers
Where it is reasonably practicable, employers should avoid the need for their employees to undertake manual handling where it can cause them injury. Where it is not reasonably practicable, they must make a suitable and adequate assessment of all of the manual handling operations, take steps to reduce the risk of injury to the lowest level possible and take steps to provide information to employees of the precise weight and the heaviest side of any load where the centre of gravity is not in the middle.
Duties of Employees
Employees need to make use of any equipment which is provided to help with any lifting. For example this could include using wheel barrows or pulley systems to lift something from the ground.
EXAMPLE: your employer needs you to move some boxes of paper from one office to another as the printer has been moved. They must make an adequate assessment of what manual handling will be involved. This could include how it would be lifted and provide a walkway and area for the boxes to be placed down again. They could reduce the risk further by splitting the boxes of paper down and informing the employee of the weight of each they will carry and where the centre of gravity is. They could reduce this risk further by providing something to move the boxes from the different offices. The employee must then make use of that equipment, provided they have had correct training of course.
If you believe your employer has not done this and you have been injured as a result, call The Injury Lawyers today and we can see if you can make a claim!
