Simple listening can be a powerful tool for learning

A few examples of macro-ergonomics? ...

"Nowadays, Imada roams the globe from Japan to Brazil to Sweden, a busy consultant and respected pioneer in a field that many people hardly know exists – macro-ergonomics. The field is only about two decades old. The first International Symposium on Human Factors in Organizational Design and Management was held in Waikiki in 1984.

The key, he said, is “listening as if you are in the presence of a great teacher,” even to the lowest status worker on the shop floor. In one study, which involved the sale of tens of millions of dollars worth of hot dogs at a sports stadium, the solution for gaining efficiency was to lower the counters.

This was “not rocket science,” said Imada, because production engineers have long understood that keeping work steps at the same level cuts down on waste motion."   continued ...   (Via The Maui News)

Management-Based Safety Can Take Your Program to New Heights

Hats off to the airline industry ...

"What's the safest industry in the country? According to one consultant, the answer is in the clouds.

In 2002, U.S. scheduled air carriers had 10 million departures, flew more than 7 billion miles, accumulated 17 million flight hours and had 34 accidents – none of which resulted in fatalities, according to the National Transportation Safety Board. That translated to 0.195 accidents per 100,000 flight hours and 0.0048 accidents per 1 million miles flown.

By contrast, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. workplaces in 2002 experienced 4.7 million OSHA recordable injury and illness cases – meaning 5.3 of every 100 employees experienced an OSHA recordable case. Also in 2002, 5,524 workers – five out of every 100,000 employees – died on the job.

Gualardo believes it comes down to several key elements that are ingrained in the airline industry's safety culture: Continuous safety training and re-training of pilots; tightly regulated, preventative maintenance of airplanes; redundant operating systems on airplanes; rigorous self-auditing by pilots (they complete checklists before, during and after the flight) and close airline and third-party monitoring of pilots' conformance to regulatory standards; and pilots' acute awareness of the "ultimate consequence" for taking shortcuts."   continued ...   (Via Occupational Hazards)

Girl probes 'PlayStation thumb'

Well, we have had Blackberry thumb and now it extends to PlayStation thumb ...

"A 13-year-old girl has become the youngest author to be published in South Africa's main medical journal for her research on "PlayStation thumb".
Safura Abdool Karim interviewed 120 of her former schoolmates for a science project about whether they suffered problems after playing computer games.

Symptoms of "PlayStation Thumb" include blisters numbness and tingling, mainly in the thumb, she wrote.

She said the condition is similar to Repetitive Strain Injury (RSI)."   continued ...   (Via BBC NEWS)

Working misery

An old story worth mentioning again ...

"If you're wondering why you go home from work every evening with a knot in your neck and an ache in your wrist, the answer may be staring you in the face.

According to a Cnet.com report, doctors in the US are getting more patients who complain of aches and pains because of long hours in front of a laptop computer.

Doctors say the main problem with laptops is that, with the screen and keyboard located close to each other, users are forced to adopt bad postures for extended periods. For instance, they have to hunch to view the monitor."   continued ...   (Via The Electric New Paper)

Lab findings suggest reason cell phones and driving don't mix

It has to do with cognition and attention, not psychomotor function ...

"The reason talking on a cell phone makes drivers less safe may be that the brain can't simultaneously give full attention to both the visual task of driving and the auditory task of listening, a study by a Johns Hopkins University psychologist suggests.

The study, published in a recent issue of The Journal of Neuroscience, reinforces earlier behavioral research on the danger of mixing mobile phones and motoring.

"Our research helps explain why talking on a cell phone can impair driving performance, even when the driver is using a hands-free device," said Steven Yantis, a professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences in the university's Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts and Sciences.

"The reason?" he said. "Directing attention to listening effectively 'turns down the volume' on input to the visual parts of the brain. The evidence we have right now strongly suggests that attention is strictly limited ? a zero-sum game. When attention is deployed to one modality ? say, in this case, talking on a cell phone ? it necessarily extracts a cost on another modality ? in this case, the visual task of driving.""   continued ...   (Via cellular-news)

ASSE: Integrating Fitness into Safety

Fitness can be viewed a preventitive safety ...

"By tightly linking safety, fitness and supervisor leadership, companies can achieve high rates of participation in physical fitness activities and take steps to curb rising health care costs, a safety and health consultant told attendees at the American Society of Safety Engineers' annual conference in New Orleans.

Fred Drennan, president of Team Safety Inc., noted that the work force is aging, with half of the nation's 146 million workers over 40.

"As people age, they become more sedentary," he said, adding that 60 percent of Americans are overweight and out of shape. And many times, he said, worker fitness declines but job tasks remain the same. This contributes to costly cumulative trauma disorders."   continued ...   (Via Occupational Hazards)

A Hearing Aid for Cell Phones

This could be a life saver for the hearing impaired ...

"Can you hear me now?" isn't just a slogan; it's an annoyingly familiar refrain for cell-phone users. Palo Alto startup Sound ID wants to silence that question by outfitting wireless headsets with software used to help the hearing impaired. Its Personal Sound System uses sound-processing algorithms to analyze acoustic environments, so if someone is stuck in a noisy restaurant, the headset instantly boosts the voice signal, separating it from background noise and increasing the volume of human speech by 2 decibels. When the user moves into a quieter room, the levels stabilize. "The system knows which sounds your ear is missing," says Rodney Perkins, Sound ID's founder and chairman."   continued ...   (Via Business 2.0)

Construction industry is warned about back injuries

The construction industry is vulnerable to many health and safety problems ...

"Health inspectors will today warn the construction industry of the dangers of back injuries.

Over 270 Scottish construction companies are due to gather for a safety awareness day in Livingston, West Lothian.

The industry suffers from one of the poorest records of back-related injuries. Experts say many instances can be easily avoided if preventative action is taken by employers and employees.

The day will focus on ergonomics in the construction sector, a demonstration of helpful lifting aids and alternative light-weight materials that can be used to reduce the risk of injury."   continued ...   (Via Scotsman)

BrailleNote PK

A great PDA for blind users ...

"I’m loving the BrailleNote PK, a PDA for the blind. It has an 18-cell Braille display, Bluetooth, and just about everything you need to handle your appointments, notes, and contacts in a tiny package. Essentially, this is an ActiveSync compatible PIM with stopwatch, e-book reader, word processor, and a lot of amazing stuff. There’s also a text-to-speech system and a video-out for the sighted."   continued ...   (Via Gizmodo)

Poor posture at screen can be pain in the neck

A few practical tips from a user ...

"I'm old — 58 — and most of the players are young. The other night, I was playing with a group that had to stop our killing ways when a fellow warrior was told by his mom to go to bed.

I should be sitting with my feet on the floor, my neck should be straight, and the monitor should be about 18 to 30 inches away from my eyes. Ergonomic experts tell me that what seems comfortable at first — like my lazy posture — can cause pain over time. The monitor should be at eye level, especially for people who wear bifocals or trifocal lenses.

Posture is just one step to comfortable computing. Here are some others:

• Loosen up
• Take breaks
• Level with me
• Turn down the lights
• And more ..."

   continued ...   (Via Daily Sentinel)