There are several reliable methods for reducing injury in the workplace, including making sure you are staying up to code and following proper OSHA and EHS protocols.

One underused method of preventing incidents utilizes injury records to get a better grasp of what you can do to mitigate future problems.

When you record what happens in the workplace you can better understand the scope of what goes on at any given time. In cases of injury reports and data collection, more and more agencies and companies are using this method to not only prevent injury but to make sure work environments are up to code.

Recently OSHA has begun using the data of injury reports to specifically target businesses with inspections. This site-specific targeting has been in place for a couple years now and it looks like OSHA is keeping it around.

You Can’t Fool Data

One reason for this might be the fact that you can’t get around data. Going off of the hard data found in injury reports, EPA officials can make a judgment on whether or not to target a specific industry. This reduces costs and wasted time, as well as increasing the general safety of the industries in question.

Keeping injury records also would allow a business to weed out any problems before they become big enough for OSHA to kick in. It would be potentially easy to see an anomaly in the data and reduce workplace risk by addressing the issue or area that was responsible.

Using injury records then becomes a preventive safety measure as well as a means of making sure you stay up to code.

Data can also reveal patterns and general areas of weakness you just might not be aware of otherwise. Recording it and taking the time to analyze it is something that all businesses should be implementing, especially do if there are hazards involved.

Following Regulations

It’s also important to understand that in many cases, OSHA requires record keeping in circumstances that involve hazards and workplace incidents. If you aren’t keeping up with the regulations, that’s a problem right there.

Make sure that you are doing what you can to prevent workplace injury by keeping the proper records and following the proper regulations. These will act as preventive measures for future incidents and problems.