Authors (including presenting author) :
Mak JYY(1), Chiang WKH(1)
Affiliation :
(1)Physiotherapy Department, Shatin Hospital
Introduction :
Manual Handling Operation (MHO) continues to cause significant number of injuries every year in Hong Kong and MHO is the highest contributor to Physiotherapy (PT) Injury on duty (IOD) incidents among all the IOD types. According to the statistical report from PTCOC, 30% of PT IOD incidents from 2019-2024 were related to MHO problems. Routine MHO tasks in Shatin Hospital (SH) PT department were studied which include assisting transfer during patient care, operation of assistive devices, cleansing and lifting heavy objects. From 2022 to 2023, there was an increasing trend on IOD incidents related to MHO in SH PT department. Hence, CQI program titled “Prevention of staff injury due to manual handling in PT department” was conducted and tailored for staff since 2022.
Objectives :
Systematic MHO training program aims to empower all clinical staff in PT department with standardized and appropriate MHO knowledge and technique, to reinforce the importance of occupational safety and prevent IOD incidents in PT department.
Methodology :
DMAIC method was conducted to understand the underlying cause for an increasing trend of IOD incidents related to MHO. It was revealed that the root cause of the increasing number of IOD was due to multiple contributing factors including improper environment with narrow space, inexperience and incompetent skills, miscommunication between staff to staff or staff to patient, insufficient assistive device and misjudgement in assistance required. Based on the mentioned findings, MHO training was fortified to all staff, and MHO hazards were addressed accordingly. Subsequently, a standardized MHO training program was developed for new recruits in 2023. Additionally, annual MHO audit was introduced in 2024 to ensure all clinical staff’s manual handling skills were up to standards. MHO audit assessment was intended to assess and monitor staff’s ability in performing routine MHO tasks according to the 8 principles of transfer and lifting.
Result & Outcome :
All new recruits passed MHO audit with 100% compliance after MHO training program in 2023 and 2024. Preliminary MHO audit in 2024 results showed that staff in PT department scored over 94% on average for each routine MHO tasks. Moreover, the number IOD incidents related to MHO remained 0 from 2023-2024. In conclusion, systematic MHO training program was effective in reducing IOD incidents related to MHO in SH PT department.
