Health and Safety
Executive / Commission
Slips and trips
Slipping accidents cause many thousand of occupational and public sector injuries every year involving broken bones, pain suffering and financial loss for society. The perception by the public, the workforce and by many who are responsible for designing floors for use both inside and outside is that these accidents are inevitable. Not true. The reality is that sensible precautions can and do eliminate the majority of these accidents and if the problem is explained and sensible floor choices made then the risks to those who ultimately use the floor can be managed more effectively. Where better to make that right choice of flooring than at the very beginning of the design process taking a balanced view of cost, durability, aesthetics and safety targeting those areas that are foreseeably wet. Getting it right by design is a giant step forwards in reducing slip injuries.
A vital part of the Health and Safety Commission's programme to reduce the number of slip accidents in the UK is to support and endorse industry written practical guidance for those who design, procure and manage flooring in buildings.
This Specifiers' Handbook has been produced by the Centre For Accessible Environments and published by RIBA Publishing and provides a practical understanding of how to provide internal flooring that enables all users of all abilities to be safe as they navigate around the buildings they use.
The document is based upon work undertaken by the Health and Safety Laboratory and others and contains advice on the mechanics of slipping, common flooring contaminants, the importance of surface roughness, testing methods, the slip potential for commonly specified flooring materials and some excellent case studies.
The Specifiers' Handbook is sponsored by the Health and Safety Executive and a priced copy can be obtained from RIBA Publishing www.ribabookshops.com quoting ISBN 1-85946-255-3
If you need detailed and practical guidance on how to choose new flooring or improve existing floors and stairs in order to stop people from slipping, this document is for you.
Once you understand what can cause a slip you are half way to finding a solution. This guide looks at all the different factors that lead to slips happening e.g. inappropriate flooring material, dry and wet contamination, shoe soles, cleaning regimes, human factors and environmental issues. It also introduces the Slip Potential Model, which helps you predict, through your risk assessments, where slips may happen. The section on the health, safety and building legislation also helps you understand your statutory obligations. Whilst the real life case studies illustrate how others have or hope to overcome their slip problems.
This document was written for people who design, procure and manage flooring in buildings, but as it is easy to follow it would suit anyone who wanted detailed knowledge on how to prevent slips and if followed, should significantly reduce the number of accidents on existing and new floors.
The guide is published by the Construction Industry Research Information Association, written by Arup Project management and co-funded by HSE, the Rail Safety and Standards Board, London Underground, Tubelines, the Department of Health and the British Council of Shopping Centres and is based on research mostly carried out by Health and Safety Laboratory. Other bodies responsible for the design maintenance and operation of transport systems, shopping centres and hospitals - all organisations where the costs of slipping incidents are high - have also considerably helped in the production of the guide.
It is available as a priced hard copy from CIRIA Books but can also be accessed in PDF format at no cost under that link to CIRIA 'Safer Surfaces to Walk on ...' .