OSHA Expands Injury Reporting Requirements, Updates List of Exempt Employers

​The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has announced the publication of a final rule that expands the agency's severe injury and illness reporting requirements and updates the list of employers who are partially exempt from OSHA record-keeping requirements. Under the preceding regulations, employers covered by the Occupational Safety and Health Act were required to report only nonfatal inpatient hospitalizations involving three or more employees. The revised regulations will require employers to report all work-related inpatient hospitalizations, amputations, or accidents involving the loss of an eye within 24 hours of the incident. A September 11, 2014, statement about the rule from the U.S. Department of Labor Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health, David Michaels, PhD, MPH, describes an incident in which a factory employee was killed by a machine that had previously crushed the arm of one coworker and caused another to suffer an amputation. He explains that if the new requirements had been in effect, the reporting of the earlier injuries to OSHA may have led to an investigation of the machine, which had one of its important safety features disabled, and possibly prevented the death.