What Does
Occupational Health And Safety Assessment Mean?
An occupational health and safety assessment is done to evaluate the risk involved in the workplace with objectives to remove, reduce, and replace the source of risk with a safer equipment or process, or to lessen the risk to the health and safety of the workers.
Safeopedia Explains Occupational Health And Safety Assessment
An occupational safety and health assessment is important for the safety and morale of the employees or legal and financial reasons. By law, employers need to protect their employees by establishing preventative, punitive, and compensatory effects.
An occupational safety and health assessment helps to reduce the number of work related deaths and injuries, sick-leave, medical expenditure, disability benefit costs. It also promotes improvement of quality, production, profit, and minimizes worker migration.
An occupational safety and health assessment involves following actions:
- Identifying hazards and those who are at risk and why they are at risk
- Evaluating and prioritizing risks and what the risks are
- Deciding on preventive actions about how to eliminate or reduce the risk
- Taking actions by elimination, reduction, and replacement using alternatives
- Monitoring and reviewing for further improvement
- Documenting the assessment and reporting
An internationally accepted standard, occupational health and safety assessment series (OHSAS 18001), was established in April of 1999 and revised in July of 2007 to provide organizations with a globally accepted system to reduce or eliminate occupational health and safety risks to employees.
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