Employees complaining of back pain

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Rhiannon,

You mentioned that you " have exactly the same workstations as the old place". Although the desk/work surface might be the same, the lighting, ventilation, floor to ceiling, and many other features of the workstation will be different.

Having given staff the necessary tools previously, you need to make sure these are still relevant now, and if so, give the staff proper training to use these. Under H&S law, they have an obligation to protect their health, and if they refuse to use equipment or adjust their posture to protect their backs, they can't then moan to you, but you could consider disciplinary action against them for failing to adhere to H&S procedures. Then see how quickly they moan about their backs!


Karl Limpert

Yo Rhiannon, a refreshing and positive solution focused approach involving those affected and providing you keep your ears on sounds like your open relationship management culture will continue to engage....

I'm sure your induction program covering the ergonomics of 'their' occupational health and importance of fitness to their well-being should continue to open the way for positive feedback and interaction with early warning of any potential problems.

In the case of the two that are 'known' to be experiencing discomfort and potential stress increasing the risk of fatigue related MSD's associated with any RSI you will have to adsvise that they visit their GP and participate in whatever treatment advised including physiotherapy and or GP subsidised on prescription referral to local leisure / recreation centre to improve fitness.

Whilst, any potential harm / injury claim would be defended with contributory neglegence one should be seen to be acting on a "known" situation as omission to act on this information would be equally neglegent.

Thank you so much for the comments so far, all very helpful.

I am currently doing fresh risk assessments due to a change in premises so I will be able to record a lot of information and it will be up to date, although we have exactly the same workstations as the old place, it still needs doing.

Unfortunately the ones with the trouble live about 30 minutes away and either drive in or get public transport so not much chance of walking or cycling, although walking the final hill instead of the shuttle bus would do some good I'm sure.
We have our staff doing quite a range of things and whereas they only do a single type of manufacturing the different processes it goes through involves many different things, some sitting, some standing.
I've had a chat with one of the staff who has come up with some very helpful suggestions for new equipment, he is the newest member of staff here and is quite happy to offer suggestions, that's the kind of employee we like.
Maybe Lora is right, some people just like a good moan no matter what you do to help! :)

Back pain is not a new phenomenon. Ever since our ancestors decided to walk upright, the extra stresses placed on the spine (which evolved for walking and running on all fours) will have caused intermittent pain and degenerative changes. The new phenomenon is the high level of disability caused by back pain. In the past, people just got on with their lives without a second thought, and as a result their pain settled quickly and they did not develop any serious problems.

The three reasons why we now see high levels of disability are:

1. Inappropriate beliefs about back pain, often fostered by unhelpful comments and advice from clinical carers.

2. Lack of fitness and obesity.

3. People adopt a disabled lifestyle because it is easier or there are financial or other incentives to do so such as successful litigation, early payment of pensions etc.

A great deal of research has now been done into back pain, and as a result, clear guidelines have been written for GPs and occupational physicians. The main message from these is that for back pain without so-called ‘red flag symptoms’ (which might indicate a serious underlying problem), the individual should exercise and they should avoid rest. Active work will help and will not be harmful.

When looking at occupations, the only evidence that work can be harmful shows that people who undertake frequent heavy lifting such as dock workers, farmers and forestry workers have greater degeneration of their backs, but those doing light manual tasks such as most nurses, industrial workers, retail workers etc. are in an ideal role. Workers who sit at a desk all day tend to suffer more degeneration than those who are active.

So the simple message is that if your staff are sitting hunched up all day they will suffer from back pain and degenerative changes, but will benefit if they can lose weight and get fit. What can you do? Allow and encourage them to stand and stretch regularly throughout the day. Can they work on a rotation so they do different tasks say every thirty minutes? Can you encourage staff to cycle or walk to work with incentives? Have you introduced any other schemes to encourage fitness and positive lifestyle changes?

The other thing, although not terribly helpful, is that some people just enjoy a good moan! I'm a DSE assessor and half of the answers on some peoples risk assesments are nothing to do with the question, it's just a good opportunity to vent.

So long as you have a written record of everything you have put in place to help, your risk assesments are current and checked regularly, and you've asked the staff in question to visit the doctor and followed any relevant advise, then surely that would have to be seen as doing everything "reasonably practicable".

The employee's also may benefit from being reminded they have a duty of care to themselves as well. So as long as you've covered yourself it might be time to accept that some people just don't want to be helped!

It's worth doing a risk assessment for the workstations, and inviting the employees to contribute to this with a self-assessment form.

If you're doing everything you can though, the employees need to be reminded that H&S is their responsibility as much as the employers. You can only provide the training & appropriate equipment; they have to ensure they use it, simply to avoid these problems, and any absences that might arise from them.

If there is more you can do, this should be identified from a proper risk assessment, but the employees have to accept a safe working environment isn't always the one they would prefer - most people on a building site would happily discard their fluorescent jackets & uncomfortable hard hats, but no more can they do that than your employees can ignore the equipment you've already provided.

At work we have a couple of employees complaining of back pain and whereas I'm very sympathetic, I have back trouble myself, I am at a loss of where to proceed to help anymore than we have.
We recently moved premises and we deal in manufacturing items, They are not overly small or fiddly. We have new and not cheap chairs which provide myself and the others with adequate back support but the staff with problems hunch over their work. We have tried raising the work surface but they complain that they don't like it being that high up. We have supplied magnifiers to use during the process but they refuse to use them and prefer working by eye.
From what I've read about the subject weight and general fitness can be an issue and whereas I'm not about to tell someone that they need to lose weight, the main complainees would certainly benefit from it as my own back only stopped being a problem when I became no longer overweight. I try to get them to have regular breaks at the moment but most of the time the refuse and say they'd rather carry on working even though we do not push them with targets and they have the time to take the breaks.
I understand how horrible it is to have trouble and I really want to help them as much as I can but I'm running out of ideas on how to change things to stop the pain. Does anyone have any suggestions or know what sort of measures we have to legally take regarding back pain, which may not necesarily be caused by work?
Thanks