Overview
Keywords: Musculoskeletal disorders, safe patient handling, safety culture, nurses/nursing, acute care hospital
Timeline: November 2015 - present
Researchers: Dwayne van Eerd (Principal Investigator, Institute for Work & Health), Ivan Streenstra, Ben Amick, and Trevor King (Institute for Work & Health), Amy Chow (Mount Sinai Hospital)
Funder: CRE-MSD
Project type: Seed grant
Partner: Mount Sinai Hospital
Sector/Workplace type: Healthcare sector
Themes:
Theme
4
Interventions
Theme
5
Implementation
Background/rationale
Patient handling places nurses at high risk for injury. Feasible and effective interventions are required to prevent costly work disability.
Research question/objectives/methods
The pilot project objective is to evaluate the effectiveness of an evidence-based, multifaceted, occupational health and safety program aimed to increase staff self-efficacy, safety social norms, use of equipment and proper decision-making. A secondary objective is to evaluate whether injury incident counts, exposure rates, and lost and modified work days are impacted in the short term by the program mentioned above.
The overall goal of implementing the program is to support hazard identification, promote knowledge and skills transfer to boost individual self-efficacy and support the internal responsibility system by improving the current safety culture.
Key findings
Expected Outcomes: This pilot project will contribute to much needed evidence about interventions to reduce the risk of disabling injuries related to patient handling in healthcare. The findings will help relevant stakeholders understand how to build self-efficacy and improve safety culture related to patient handling activities.
Implications for the prevention of MSD
This project will provide evidence to support future patient handling interventions in the healthcare sector to prevent musculoskeletal disorders.
Knowledge dissemination
Project outcomes will be presented at stakeholder events such as conferences and external meetings (e.g., Association for Canadian Ergonomists, Ontario Nurses’ Association (ONA), etc.), in addition to contributing to publications and other communication materials.