Ergonomics works DeMarco Compton, UAW Local 1700, uses an ergonomic arm to install heavy batteries—thus reducing the strain the job once entailed. In addition, the UAW worked with DaimlerChrysler to install a "skillet line" (note the bellows-like device under the vehicle) which allows each car to be raised or lowered at a work station at DaimlerChrysler’s Sterling Heights Assembly Plant.

"Sharp pains would go up my wrist, and the pain kept getting worse and worse," UAW Local 1700 member Faye Smith says. Her suffering was caused by the torquing motion of the wrenches she used at the DaimlerChrysler Sterling Heights Assembly Plant just north of Detroit.

Eventually she underwent surgery on one hand, was off work for three months, came back with work restrictions, and was sent home again. She is back on the assembly line.

Repetitive motion injuries--like those suffered by Faye Smith--and other ergonomic traumas are the nation’s most common type of occupational safety and health injury. In 1997 alone more than 620,000 workers suffered musculoskeletal injuries in the workplace.

Preventable injuries Carpal tunnel syndrome, a painful injury to the wrists, is preventable. Faye Smith had to undergo surgery on her right hand because of an ergonomic injury.

After over a decade of studying the problem, last November the federal government’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) issued a proposed standard which would cover employees who work in manufacturing or manual handling.

Hearings are now underway across the country. In March and early April, UAW health and safety experts and workers from several UAW-represented workplaces testified in Washington D.C. and Chicago.

Continued