Why is it important? – It’s good to know the benefits, so we’ve listed 10 reasons why health and safety is important.
It is morally right to ensure your workers return home safe and healthy at the end of every working day. By protecting your workers, you reduce absences, ensuring that your workplace is more efficient and productive, Research shows that workers are more productive in workplaces that are committed to health and safety. Reducing down-time caused by illness and accidents means less disruption – and saves your business money, In some countries, health and safety legislation is criminal law and you are legally obliged to comply with it. Legal breaches can result in prosecution, fines and even imprisonment of senior executives. To attract investors and partnerships you may need to demonstrate your commitment to sustainability and corporate social responsibility, which will include how you protect your workers. Increasingly, customers want to buy products and services that are produced ethically – so you also need to think about the work practices throughout your supply chain and deal only with ethical suppliers that protect their workforce. More and more, job hunters – particularly Millennials and Generation Z – seek roles with employers who share their values, so without strong corporate responsibility and sustainability practices you may struggle to attract or retain the best employees, A good health and safety record is a source of competitive advantage : it builds trust in your reputation and brand, while poor health and safety performance will directly affect profitability and can result in loss of trade or even closure of the business. Good health and safety at work secures long-term benefits for you, your business and the wider community.
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Why are safety policies and procedures important?
Safety rules in the workplace are important because they protect employees, customers and the company’s brand reputation. Enforcing safety rules can reduce on-the-job accidents and injuries and maximize productivity. Limiting risks can improve the work environment and job satisfaction of employees.
Why is safety important in health?
Patient Safety
The occurrence of adverse events due to unsafe care is likely one of the 10 leading causes of death and disability in the world (1). In high-income countries, it is estimated that one in every 10 patients is harmed while receiving hospital care (2). The harm can be caused by a range of adverse events, with nearly 50% of them being preventable (3). Each year, 134 million adverse events occur in hospitals in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), due to unsafe care, resulting in 2.6 million deaths (4). Another study has estimated that around two-thirds of all adverse events resulting from unsafe care, and the years lost to disability and death (known as disability adjusted life years, or DALYs) occur in LMICs (5). Globally, as many as 4 in 10 patients are harmed in primary and outpatient health care. Up to 80% of harm is preventable. The most detrimental errors are related to diagnosis, prescription and the use of medicines (6). In OECD countries, 15% of total hospital activity and expenditure is a direct result of adverse events (2). Investments in reducing patient harm can lead to significant financial savings, and more importantly better patient outcomes (2). An example of prevention is engaging patients, if done well, it can reduce the burden of harm by up to 15% (6).
Patient Safety is a health care discipline that emerged with the evolving complexity in health care systems and the resulting rise of patient harm in health care facilities. It aims to prevent and reduce risks, errors and harm that occur to patients during provision of health care.
A cornerstone of the discipline is continuous improvement based on learning from errors and adverse events. Patient safety is fundamental to delivering quality essential health services. Indeed, there is a clear consensus that quality health services across the world should be effective, safe and people-centred.
In addition, to realize the benefits of quality health care, health services must be timely, equitable, integrated and efficient. To ensure successful implementation of patient safety strategies; clear policies, leadership capacity, data to drive safety improvements, skilled health care professionals and effective involvement of patients in their care, are all needed.
What is the purpose of safety procedures in the workplace?
Safe work procedures Safe work procedures are directions on how work is to be carried out safely and are required for all hazardous tasks performed at your workplace. They identify hazards and clarify what must be done to eliminate or minimise risks. For example, you may need to develop procedures for handling cash or disposing of hot oil.
What should safety and security policies contain?
1. Physical workplace security – Your physical security is often the first line of defense for employee safety, It revolves around the security of your physical office locations. It should cover everything from access control, ID verification, and alarms and surveillance,
It should also incorporate fire prevention, visitor and employee tracking systems, and any physical assets you have in the office. This includes laptops, monitors, desks, and more. Creating your security policy requires planning, detail, and attention. You must ensure it covers everything you need. For example, if you have different office locations around the world, your policy should cover how to track visitors and employees in every office.
One easy way to do this is through a visitor management system, where you can see who is in and where. Features like blocklists also help to keep unwanted intruders out of the building.
What is the aim of the HSE?
Protecting people and places The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is Britain’s national regulator for workplace health and safety. We are dedicated to protecting people and places, and helping everyone lead safer and healthier lives. Our role goes beyond worker protection to include public assurance.
What is a safety objective?
2 – How Safety Objectives Are Created – Safety objectives are created in response to organizational safety goals and objectives. For example, you might have a safety goal of:
“Develop a positive, non-punitive hazard reporting culture.”
Each safety goal may have multiple safety objectives that allow your organization to account for that each goal. In the case of our example safety goal above, you could create several different objectives that help account for and measure the performance of that goal, such as:
- Increase hazard reporting by 10% over the previous year;
- Reduce average day for hazard reporting for new employees to less than 14 days; and
- Train at least 95% of employees on hazard identification.
These objectives will acutely help you understand whether or not your company is reaching that goal. These objectives are also specific and easily measurable, In the example above, the hazard identification training objective supports your goal of developing a positive, hazard reporting culture.
