Ergonomics Human Factors A world beyond manual handling

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Ergonomics Human Factors A world beyond
manual handling

• Jon Anslow
• HM Inspector of Health and Safety (Human Factors)
• Corporate Specialist Division
• Nottingham

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(No Transcript)
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Ergonomics Human Factors

• How humans interact physically
• and psychologically within the
• work environment.

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Unpacking Human Factors

• Physical
• Manual handling, Thermal environment,
  Anthropometrics, Visibility, Noise.
• Organisational
• Safety Culture, Behavioural safety, Competence,
  Procedures, Managing change
• Psychological
• Human reliability, Fatigue, Human Machine
  Interaction, Vigilance / Attention .

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Human Factors at work

• Individual (Who is doing the work)
• Competence, skills, personality, motivation,
  risk perception, attitudes, fatigue, strength,
  vision, hearing
• Job (What are people being asked to do)
• Task, workload, procedures, tools, environment,
  complexity, P.P.E
• Organisation (Where are they working)
• Management commitment, supervision,
  communication, safety culture

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Humans are key in getting safety right or getting
safety wrong
Accident ?
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Are Human Factors really Important ?

• HSE recognises the importance that human factors
  can play in helping avoid accidents and
  ill-health at work. Up to 80 of accidents are
  often attributed to human error.
• (HSE website)

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Can accident rates keep falling?
Engineering approach to safety
Incident rates
Systems approach
Human Factors ?
1970 1990
2010
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HSE human factors

• Human factors is well established in major
  hazards
• Oil and gas industries (on and off shore)
• Chemical industry
• Nuclear Industry
• Railways and aviation (non-HSE enforced)
• Established Human Factors inspection history
• Investigations regularly include Human Factors
  Specialist Inspector input
• Human Factors is an integral part of a safety
  case, safety report or in the granting of
  licenses.

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HSE human factors

• Human Factors outside of major hazard
  industries
• Factories, hospitals, construction sites
• HSE is taking human factors seriously
• Human Factors support in HSE accident
  investigations
• Growing number of proactive Human Factors
  interventions

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Examples of applicable Regulations

• Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 Section 2
• Training (Competence)
• Safe systems of work (Procedures)
• Working environment (Lighting, temperature..)
• Supply of Machinery (safety) Regulations 1992
  Regulation 12
• taking ergonomic principles into account.
• e.g. Anthropometrics in guarding, lighting,
  noise, fatigue, psychological stress and design
  of control systems.

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My recent human factors work

• Safety culture intervention at a steel works
• Advisory visit on behavioural safety
• Assessment of MSD risk in a garden centre
• Evidential review of competence and routine
  violations in a food factory
• Getting the right patient the right exposure in a
  radiology department.
• Management of WRULD in a call centre
• Assessment of control room operations and
  procedures at a major hazard site.

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HSE Human Factors web pages

• http//www.hse.gov.uk/humanfactors/in
  dex.htm

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Human Factors briefing notes

• Human Factors briefing notes (Free to download)
• Introduction to human factors
• Competency assurance
• Humans and risk
• Procedures
• Emergency response
• Maintenance error
• http//www.hse.gov.uk/humanfactors/comah/briefingn
  otes.htm

7. Safety culture 8. Communications 9. Alarm
handling 10. Fatigue 11. Organisational change
12. Human factors in the Major Accident
Prevention Policy
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Briefing note 10 - Fatigue

• Briefing on the effects of fatigue on human
  performance
• What can cause fatigue?
• What are the main effects of fatigue?
• How can we avoid or reduce fatigue?
• Case study

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What can cause fatigue?

• The main factors are
• Acute lack of sleep
• Cumulative lack of sleep
• Poor quality sleep lots of interruptions
• Having to work at a low point in the day
• Long working hours, particularly if these are as
  long as 14 to 16 hours
• Poorly-designed shift work
• Inadequate breaks during the working day

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The main effects of fatigue at work?

• Compared with their normal state, a fatigued
  person will
• Find it hard to concentrate
• Find it difficult to make clear decisions
• Find it hard to take in and act on information
• Have more frequent lapses of attention or memory
• React more slowly (for example, to hazards
  arising in the workplace)
• Make more errors
• Occasionally fall asleep at work momentarily or
  for several minutes
• May suffer increased ill health and absenteeism

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How can we avoid or reduce fatigue?

• Make sure employees have the opportunity to sleep
  for at least 8 hours between shifts
• Encourage employees to develop good sleeping
  habits
• Restrict night shifts to 4 in a row or to 2 in a
  row if they are 12 hour shifts
• Allow at least 2 days off after nights
• Make sure shifts rotate forwards - mornings,
  followed by afternoons followed by nights
• Avoid long shifts and manage overtime

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Fatigue and Risk Index

•    
• http//www.hse.gov.uk/research/rrhtm/rr446.htm

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Managing Shift work
Health and Safety Guidance (HSG 256)

• The guidance aims to
• make employers aware of their duty under law,
• improve understanding of the risks of shift work,
• provide advice on risk assessment and key risk
  factors,
• offer practical measures to help reduce the
  risks,
• reduce fatigue, errors and accidents.

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Inspectors Human Factors Tool Kit

• A more detailed Inspectors guide to Human
  Factors
• Each topic includes a method of inspection
• 1. Introduction to the inspectors human factors
  toolkit
• 2. Competence assurance
• 3. HF in accident investigations
• 4. Identifying human failures
• 5. Procedures
• 6. Emergency response
• http//www.hse.gov.uk/humanfactors/comah/toolkit.h
  tm

7. Maintenance error 8. Safety critical 9.
communications 10. Safety culture 11. Alarm
handling 12. Organisational change
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Example inspection method
Question set Reliability and usability of
procedures
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Example inspection method
Question set Reliability and usability of
procedures
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Barriers to integration of human Factors

• Lack of awareness understanding of what human
  factors really are
• Seeing ergonomics only as manual handling and DSE
  assessments
• Human factors is often seen as nothing more than
  Behavioural safety programmes
• Focusing on engineering and systems approaches to
  safety without equal rigour for Human Factors
• Increased rate of organisational change
  corporate memory decline and complacency

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Further information

• HSG48 Reducing error and
  influencing behaviour
• Available from
• http//www.hsebooks.com/Books/

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Key messages Human Factors Ergonomics

• Human Factors is a way of thinking about health
  and safety centred on the human.
• Human Factors is more than manual handling, more
  than DSE and more than behavioural safety.
• Human Factors is not just for the major hazard
  sector

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• Accidents do not exist in the world but only in
  our heads. There is no world without causation,
  and the idea of accident reflects the limits of
  human perception, our inability to know all
  connections and so pursue total causality
• Franz Kafka
• (Letter to a
  friend)