The state's workplaces are getting safer, and that is good news not only for the customers and employees who are suffering fewer injuries, but for employers who could see some relief in their workers compensation insurance bills, News Radio 1200 WOAI reports.
Stacey Rose, who heads Safety Services for workers comp provider Texas Mutual, told a workplace safety conference in San Antonio that a number of factors are leading to safer workplaces, mainly an awareness that leads to workplace safety being 'baked in' to plants, offices, and retail buildings even before they're built.
"That's a best practice, that if there are potential hazards along the way, you want to engineer them out," she said.
Participants told of being more aware of the causes of workplace accidents, and building structures with wider aisles, more accessible hallways, and non slip floors.
Rose said its gotten to the point where it is easier to quickly determine if a work site is more likely to experience on the job accidents.
"If you see people out there not wearing the required personal protective equipment, that is one indication that, maybe safety culture isn't what it needs to be here," she said.
And, even though exotic injuries like being run over by heavy equipment or getting limbs crushed in machinery get all the media attention, Rose says one type of on the job injury remains the most common.
"Slips, trips, and falls, no matter what industry you go to, are very prevalent," she said.
That is largely due to the fact that whether it is a working manufacturing facility, a high tech laboratory, a school, or a retail store, people are always going to slip and fall. The key is to make sure it happens less frequently, and with less serious injury.