Shirley Gee and Terrie George work together as "lifting buddies."
The environmental services (EVS) team at Cassia Regional Hospital has had a significant decrease in lifting injuries since implementing a new safety process in 2018. The process is working so well that they haven’t had a single lifting injury in 2020. Their process is now being rolled out across Intermountain.
Here’s how it works:
- Each caregiver is assigned a “lifting buddy” at the beginning of each shift.
- Anytime a caregiver needs to lift something heavy, they’ll ask their buddy to help.
- If the lifting buddy isn’t available, the caregiver should ask another team member to help.
Guidelines on when to use a lifting buddy:
- If you can’t easily move the item with your foot.
- If the load contains wet linen, which can be much heavier than it seems.
- If there’s no place to grab the load safely.
- If there are rough edges or abnormalities that could affect your grip.
- If you must carry the load for a long distance.
- If you need to lift the item over your head.
- When the load requires an unnatural carrying posture.
“We’ve seen a substantial decrease in lifting injuries since we started this program almost three years ago,” says Carly Nelson, Cassia EVS assistant manager. “The lifting buddy program lets our EVS caregivers know they always have someone to call when they need help lifting, moving, etc. It’s all about teamwork.”
“Lifting is a big part of the work our EVS teams do each day, so we see a good share of lifting injuries on our team,” says Mike Lamoreaux, Intermountain’s environmental support services director. “The use of the lifting buddy at Cassia has been instrumental in reducing those injuries, and it helps create and foster more teamwork — which is a double win. The team has done some amazing work on this project and we couldn’t be more proud of what they’ve accomplished.”
Mike adds, “We’re now in the process of rolling it out systemwide for all EVS teams. We appreciate the Cassia team’s work, and soon we’ll have a process in place that can be used across all our EVS teams to help prevent even more injuries.”