Home Office Ergonomic Assessment

He is also a licensed professional engineer specializing in workplace safety. With the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have recommended remote work for employees who can do so. It’s a precaution that nearly half of North American employers are currently taking. Bright lights directly behind your screen can cause eye strain. Reduce eye strain, look away from screen at least every 20 minutes, for 20 seconds and look at something at least 20 feet away.

On the positive side, physical and psychosocial supports are easily available to support at home office work, often free of charge. As the world continues navigating the challenges of remote work during a pandemic, it’s critical to ensure your employees have all of the resources they need to create a safe, productive, and peaceful work environment. With the remote employee experience continuing indefinitely, employees can truly benefit from health-conscious and innovative ideas for their work-from-home arrangement. Place your mouse within easy reach and on the same surface as your keyboard. While typing or using your mouse, keep your wrists straight, your upper arms close to your body, and your hands at or slightly below the level of your elbows. If possible, adjust the sensitivity of the mouse so you can use a light touch to operate it.

Home Office Ergonomics Checklist: 5 Things You Must Consider

“We need to step back and take a look at the safety of our work area and our home,” Davis added. Our Safety and Risk Services team works with customers to develop safe work environments. Doug Davis, the team’s Operations Manager, has worked in the insurance industry and safety profession for 34 years.

Don’t feel pressured to get right to business during meetings – take a little time to catch up. Remind your employees about the importance of stretching their legs and staying active even as they’re confined to their own homes. Performing simple stretches throughout your workday can help you stay relaxed and prevent overexertion injuries. When you are mindful of your body posture and physical pain, you can immediately correct your body alignment or get better workspace equipment.

Tips On Proper Ergonomics At Home

Some of these consider a particular employer, either in higher education or a commercial company . In this research, our interests focus on musculoskeletal disorder risk while considering the holistic nature of these costly health degradations and including various employers. Since MSDs in office environments are a function of physical factors, including posture and duration, and psychophysical elements [8–10], multiple dimensions must be considered. In this study, we consider work practices, worker perception, working tools, physical layout, posture, and adherence to ergonomics recommendations. A checklist is perhaps the most efficient way for an employer to standardize and communicate ergonomic principles and safety guidelines.

• The quality of your desk products, in combination with how they’re arranged, provide your body with support to get through long days of work.
• Additionally, the angle between your forearm and upper arm should be between 90 and 110 degrees while your arms are resting on the desk.
• Adjust the contrast, brightness and color of your monitor to a comfortable level.
• The fact that such factors were deemed important is consistent with observations from a systematic review of the literature into ergonomics and telework .
• If you wear bifocals, lower the monitor an additional 1 to 2 inches for more comfortable viewing.

During the transition to WFH make sure your equipment at the home office will be comfortable, supportive, and functionable. More specific examples of how to evaluate the workspace for comfort and performance are provided in the self-assessment checklist. It is not surprising that half of the ROSA scores calculated with this population suggest that “further assessment follow as soon as possible”. Other studies have found average scores of at least this level, and people experiencing pre-existing musculoskeletal pain have significantly higher ROSA scores than those without .

Why Is Ergonomics Important?

Therefore, employers should ensure that any materials or equipment they provide to home-based employees is in safe working condition and that employees are instructed in its safe installation and use. A laptop typically has a smaller screen which can cause more eye strain compared to monitors. The keyboards are often compact, causing neck and wrist injuries.

You can also buy chair cushions, which are designed to give relief and support to your lower back. To avoid neck, shoulder and back problems and injuries, your head should be kept upright in relation to the neck. The most common age group was 40–49 years followed by 50–59 years , 30–39 years and finally 19–29 years .

• On the other hand, if they are too specific, they can end up confusing the employee or lead to her ignoring the instruction completely.
• Keep your house well-lit and make sure cords are safely secured.
• According to a 2013 article in Forbes, one in five of us spent at least one day per week working from home, a number that has only grown in the ensuing two years.
• OSHA can inspect home-based worksites for hazards after you file a complaint.
• When working at a desk, the legs should be placed comfortably below the desk.
• Ensure monitor is placed inches (about an arm’s length) away from the eyes.

A footrest might be needed if the feet do not rest completely on the floor once the chair height has been properly adjusted. The footrest should be adjustable in height and inclination and provide sufficient area for the feet on the face surface of the nonskid bearing surface so that the feet do not slip off the footrest. A laptop-stand or monitor riser can assist with work from home ergonomics proper monitor alignment. Place the monitor between 20 to 40 inches away from the face and so the top of the screen is at or below eye level. Ensure forearms are approximately parallel to the floor – adjust the keyboard and mouse tray or desk height accordingly. Ensure that the ASDF row of the keyboard is at the elbow height for a sitting or standing workstation.

#3 Cut Back On Screen Time

Blinds can help, so can moving your workstation to a different area where there’s less glare. The goal is to make sure your eyes can easily see what’s on the screen. You may need a bright desk lamp if you do a lot of paperwork and dimmer lighting for computer work to stop squinting from eye strain. It’s good to take at least one long break after working for extended periods—and you probably already do so with lunch! Use this time to improve your health by going for a walk, stretching, or rehydrating either before or after eating. As your eyes tire, you might also start hunching, squinting, and pulling your screen closer than what’s recommended.

Average population standing height was 163.4 cm (standard deviation±9 cm) with men being nearly 10 cm taller than women (169.5±12.7 cm and 160.2±9.2 cm, respectively). An online questionnaire addressed physical, productivity, motivation, and work-practice factors. Photos of the worker in their home-work environment showed side and front-back perspectives. If your chair is too high for you to rest your feet flat on the floor — or the height of your desk requires you to raise the height of your chair — use a footrest.

Ask The Expert: Are There Safety Statutes On Home Office Ergonomics?

This prevents the wrist from being pressed on the hard surface for long hours, thus reducing wrist injuries. Place the monitor in a position that eliminates glare on the screen. Reflected glare can cause eye strain and sometimes causes you to lean forward to read the screen. When people have comfortable and safe workspaces, they become less susceptible to physical pain, more productive, engaged, and less prone to making mistakes. If you are using your laptop more than a few hours/days, try using an external keyboard and mouse.

Alan Hedge, PhD, CPA, Professor of Ergonomics at Cornell University prepared a handy 5-minute video that illustrates several recommendations for setting up your desk, chair, laptop and peripherals. Following the suggestions https://remotemode.net/ might make your neck, shoulders, wrists and legs more comfortable while preventing repetitive use injuries. A remote ergonomic assessment of your home office setup can improve your comfort, safety, and productivity.

Nearly ten of the 16 felt that working at home had impacted their productivity, all of those noting one or more positive impacts, and seven of that same group noting one or more negative impacts (Figs. 2 and 3). Number of respondents by perceived difference of home your home office from your work office, on a scale from 1 to 10 . HR Analytics Turn your data into business results with robust HR analytics tools. His insurance television career, short-lived but glorious, once saw him serve as the expert adviser on an insurance-themed infomercial .

Wrist rest– Should be constructed of compressible or soft material to reduce external pressure on the wrist and offer a non-friction surface. Monitor– Adjustable brightness and contrast, free from flicker and adjustable tilt. Keyboard/keyboard tray– Should lie flat and offer slope adjustability to achieve up to ± 15° slope and have a low profile (approximately 1″ or 30 mm). This can take the form of tutorial software, a PowerPoint presentation, or a web page, just to name a few examples.

Contact Mcclure Ergonomics Consulting Today To Get Started On A Remote Workplace Safety Checklist!

When it comes to work-from-home ergonomics, the three basic principles to keep in mind when setting up your workspace are posture, movement, and comfort. With electrical and fire safety concerns addressed, it’s time to look to the workstation. These questions are helpful to include in your safety checklists. Moving from workspace to workspace brings the challenge of finding a chair that’s the right height. Adjustable chairs allow you to have the proper height no matter if you’re at your desk or the kitchen table.

While our bones and backs haven’t changed, the risk factors for musculoskeletal disorders have. Each method comes with its own set of advantages and drawbacks. And, as telecommuting matures from trend to fact-of-life, we will surely develop even more ways of bringing ergonomics into the home. However, one thing is clear, rather than waiting for problems to present themselves, it is vital for employers to take the initiative and communicate clear ways to reduce risk to telecommuters in advance. By catching and reducing risk early, we can turn ergonomic health and safety into yet another advantage of telecommuting. Spending hours at a desk is a hard enough task, so adding on discomfort can make for a quite depressing work day.

As managing the home also meant managing resources, a work-home environment seems practical and cost-efficient for most families and communities. Work from home is the concept and practice of accomplishing tasks to earn income from one’s private residence. As a policy, top companies allow their employees to temporarily or permanently work from home under certain conditions. As an opportunity, different types of work and businesses can be done and managed from home. Working from home poses various pros and cons, but when the need or option arises, it is crucial to know how to work from home effectively.