subject: Manual Handling Training: Benefits Of Early Management And Prevention [print this page] You may want to ask, what is ULD? ULD stands for Upper Limb Disorders. This is present in all workplaces; even in the office. One who is exposed with ULD doesn't necessarily mean that he/she should end up having this disease. In any way, as an employer; there are means in which this can be controlled and minimize the risk of your workers to this devastating disease which may affect not only your workers but also your business.
So what are the benefits of managing, preventing and early detection of ULD bring to your business?
1. Increased efficiency. Of course, when your employees do not have any MSD bothering them, they would be able to perform to the best of their physical ability. Since physical discomfort could largely affect mental health; efficiency and productivity could well decline.
2. Working days lost to sick leaves. Individual sick leaves accumulated overtime can affect the total productivity of your employees. They might be insignificant when taken as single occurrences, but when taken as a whole, with all your employees' sick leaves taken into account, then the number of days lost to it would be minimized.
3. Fewer replacements and re-training costs can be cut. Let's admit it, for people to work efficiently first, they need training. Every year, millions of pounds go into employee training and seminars. The only problem is that when employees get sick, the possibility of employee replacement is going to be eminent. Thus, all that money on training would be lost, especially if the employee hasn't had enough time to actually give back. Protecting employees from MSDs and specially, ULD, would save the company money in the long run.
4. Reduced risk litigation
5. Lower compensation costs and insurance costs. Of course, when the employee gets sick and it's found out that it's work-caused of work-related, then the company has to do compensation for the employee and his company. And also, the company would have to pay for his insurance also.
So in the long run, if you can't or would not manage ULD while it is still manageable, both your company and your employees would suffer. You can also risk possible legal action, and more financial losses through possible compensation costs. However as the employee; it is your responsibility to help manage the problem of ULD.
Here are two steps that you can do to protect yourself and your employees from ULD and other forms of MSDs:
1. Do risk assessment. Risk assessments help you assess spots in your workplace, wherein the work activities may cause harm. It also helps you investigate current and past cases of ULD.
2. Formulate risk reduction. Of course, after your assessment and once you find the work activities that can cause or evoke ULD, then you would need to formulate ways to reduce them. Make sure that the working environment is conducive to productivity. when you introduce new changes, do it gradually so that it will give your workers some time to adjust and lessen the risks for ULD.
