When is an accident recordable

What is meant by "routine functions"? For recordkeeping purposes, an employee's routine functions are those work activities the employee regularly performs at least once per week. If you or a physician or other licensed health care professional recommends a work restriction, is the injury or illness automatically recordable as a "restricted work" case?

No, a recommended work restriction is recordable only if it affects one or more of the employee's routine job functions. To determine whether this is the case, you must evaluate the restriction in light of the routine functions of the injured or ill employee's job. If the restriction from you or the physician or other licensed health care professional keeps the employee from performing one or more of his or her routine job functions, or from working the full workday the injured or ill employee would otherwise have worked, the employee's work has been restricted and you must record the case.

How do I handle vague restrictions from a physician or other licensed health care professional, such as that the employee engage only in "light duty" or "take it easy for a week"? If you are not clear about the physician or other licensed health care professional's recommendation, you may ask that person whether the employee can do all of his or her routine job functions and work all of his or her normally assigned work shift.

If the answer to both of these questions is "Yes," then the case does not involve a work restriction and does not have to be recorded as such. If the answer to one or both of these questions is "No," the case involves restricted work and must be recorded as a restricted work case.

If you are unable to obtain this additional information from the physician or other licensed health care professional who recommended the restriction, record the injury or illness as a case involving restricted work. What is the definition of medical treatment? For the purposes of part , medical treatment does not include:. What is "first aid"? For the purposes of part , "first aid" means the following:.

Are any other procedures included in first aid? No, this is a complete list of all treatments considered first aid for part purposes. If they are examined by a doctor, given some paracetamol, and discharged, then the incident is not recordable. In the event they require an examination, and the doctor decides to keep them overnight for observation, then the incident is reportable.

Call OSHA on to report the hospitalization. Last example: the worker falls, goes to the ER, has an x-ray, receives paracetamol, and goes home. Seventy-two hours later, they have a headache and go back to the ER and the doctor admits them. The incident is not reportable because they went to the hospital long after the incident occurred. However, the incident is recordable because of the x-ray. OSHA requires you to fill out a form within seven days of a recordable incident.

The records must be maintained at the worksite for at least five years. Each February through April, employers must post a summary of the injuries and illnesses recorded the previous year. Also, if requested, copies of the records must be provided to current and former employees, or their representatives.

The date by which certain employers are required to submit to OSHA the information from their completed Form A is March 2nd of the year after the calendar year covered by the form. Employers must report any worker fatality within 8 hours and any amputation, loss of an eye, or hospitalization of a worker within 24 hours. This half-day course covers the OSHA requirements for maintaining and posting records of occupational injuries and illnesses, and reporting specific cases to OSHA.

An incident is recordable it falls into one or more of these categories:. Ironically, but perhaps not surprisingly, a few minor changes to treatment after the event can turn a non-recordable injury into a recordable OSHA event.

But if the employee develops an infection and requires a prescription for an antibiotic or other medication, the injury becomes recordable. However, any hospital admissions caused by an on-the-job injury are both recordable and reportable.

The best way to reduce OSHA-related events is to establish a comprehensive worker safety program in your business to both prevent injuries before they happen and to provide the proper care should they occur. There are also several other ways to legally and ethically reduce OSHA recordables particularly because so many of these events are as simple as a sprained ankle that ends up in the ER because there is no other way to provide support to the injured worker.

Too many companies today overtreat simple on-the-job injuries with one standard response: Going to the ER. Not only is this overkill for the majority of workplace injuries that are orthopedic and non-urgent, but it takes an exorbitant level of cash in the form of co-pays and elevated healthcare costs.

Remote Injury Care provides injured employees with access to licensed medical experts almost immediately to triage and treat most jobsite injuries.

Available wherever work happens, Remote Injury Care visits can be conducted via telephone calls or face-to-face video conferencing on smartphones, tablets or computers. Instead of making the emergency room your go-to response to any workplace injury, no matter how minor, technology allows you to connect quickly with a professional care provider that can diagnose the severity of the injury to determine the course of care.