Meatpackers Act to Curb Repetitive Motion Injuries

The meatpacking industry, the target of a new federal workplace safety program, announced on Thursday a comprehensive plan to curb repetitive motion injuries, which have reached epidemic levels in the nation’s meatpacking plants.

The American Meat Institute, the trade group for the meatpacking industry, said it is launching its biggest effort ever to uncover the causes of and solutions to carpal tunnel syndrome and other repetitive motion disorders. The disorders have afflicted workers on meatpacking disassembly lines and in dozens of other fields where the same task is performed over and over.

The most notable aspect of the group’s new program is a research effort to test recently developed equipment for detecting the early warning signs of repetitive motion trauma. The equipment also can help determine which ergonomic changes in the workplace actually help to relieve the problem.

Industry Targeted

A special device, called a vibrometer, can measure any loss of sensation in a worker’s fingertips, said to be the first sign of the onset of carpal tunnel syndrome or other repetitive motion problems. The institute has funded a study using the vibrometer, testing workers before and after their work stations are modified, to tell whether the changes are appropriate.

“This is the first time we’ve found a way to tell what works and what doesn’t,” said Sarah Lilygren, a spokeswoman for the Washington-based institute.

The meat institute’s announcement comes in the wake of a decision earlier this year by the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration to target the meat industry for “special emphasis” in its research and enforcement activities. Next to construction, meatpacking has long been considered the most dangerous industry in America, with unusually high injury rates.

Severe Wrist Problems

Most injuries in meatpacking relate to repetitive motion trauma, which health-care professionals are just now beginning to recognize as a major workplace problem. Meatpacking has a bad problem with repetitive motion injuries largely because the industry has never found an economic way to introduce automation on a large scale.

In fact, meatpacking workers still slaughter and cut meat in much the same way as 50 years ago, and the rapid and constant use of butcher knives and related tools to bone and cut meat leads to severe arm, wrist and hand injuries, primarily carpal tunnel syndrome. Carpal tunnel syndrome is a severe inflammation of nerves in the wrist that leads to a loss of strength and movement.

Roy Clawson, a spokesman for OSHA, said that the agency has targeted meatpacking for special emphasis because “it has the highest number of repetitive motion injuries of any industry in the country.”

“Repetitive motion and ergonomic issues in the workplace will be a major focus of OSHA in the 1990s,” Clawson added.