Continuing with our series of Work and Pregnancy, we will address one of the issues that most concern all mothers: the health and well-being of the fetus and the mother herself in the performance of her work functions. At work level, awareness of the prevention of occupational hazards, health surveillance and improvement of the physical conditions of the position have been imposed by legal regulations, independently of the workers' own circumstances.
Unfortunately, this risk prevention is not carried out equally in all companies and not all workers are correctly aware of what "works to live and does not live to workr ", so that health care at work is a joint task of all the members of the company, independently of the position or position held in the company.
Outside of the normal assumptions of risk prevention, pregnancy is an exceptional circumstance that requires the protection of the mother and the future child and as we said last week, in certain jobs, the adaptation and improvement of working conditions must be an immediate task to carry out. In this post, we will discern what are the main risk factors in the workplace for pregnant women and how we should prevent certain circumstances that can be very dangerous.
Physical and ergonomic factors
Within the physical factors, all the activities that may involve are included. fetal lesions or cause a placental abruption, in particular, are considered as physical factors: * Shocks, vibrations or movements. * Manual handling of heavy loads that pose risks, particularly back-to-back. * Noise * Non-ionizing radiation. * Extreme cold and heat. * Movements and postures, displacements, both inside and outside the workplace, mental and physical fatigue and other physical burdens linked to the activity of the pregnant worker, who has given birth or breastfeeding. Any job that requires some type of physical or environmental activity within those described, requires the elimination of these factors or changing jobs in the company if it were not possible. As an example we have work in cold stores, loading and unloading work or work with machinery that transmits vibrations in a continuous way.
Regarding the issue of movements, it is obvious that stooping and getting up is not a considerable physical effort under normal circumstances, but it can be an almost impossible task for pregnant women with more than five - six months gestation.
Psychosocial factors
Within the relationship of psychosocial risks, we have to highlight the factors that condition the normal and standard development of a pregnancy. Among them I highlight mainly: * Shift work, which causes important time differences in the periods of rest and sleep of the mother. * Excessive demand for work, imposed by a high rate of activity, stress, overload of tasks and extensions of the work day beyond the allowed hours. * Repetitive movements and excessive displacements. A repetitive and continuous movement generates a physical strain for the rest of the immobile body, a circumstance that affects the normal development of the fetus. In this line the activity of drive or travel permanently due to the intrinsic risk of road trips.
Chemical and biological factors
The chemical and biological factors are those that originate from the handling or exposure to certain chemicals or to certain working conditions that, without being dangerous a priori, can seriously compromise the health of the fetus and the mother. These factors are the easiest to identify since a series of codes and letters appear on the packaging and labeling of all chemical products that prevent intrinsic risks to their handling. In the case of risk for pregnancy we have the following four codifications:
This classification includes two large groups of products, those that are really dangerous, labeled with the letters R61, R40 and R46, which require a complete absence of handling during pregnancy, or, those labeled with R63 or R40 that allow their use as long as fully effective barrier means are available. This classification must always be found on the product label, just like this example label:
It may be the case that our work, a priori does not use hazardous chemicals, or we think we do not use it. Imagine jobs in an industrial laundry, graphic arts or paint stores. Big mistake, since all of them use products that may have any of the above classifications. It is our mission and that of the company, to check the list of chemical products used and the scope in the risk for pregnancy.
The complete lists of products that cannot be contacted during pregnancy or lactation are detailed in RD 39/1997 on Regulation of Prevention Services, in Annexes VII and VIII. Given its extension, this type of evaluation must always be carried out by the delegate of occupational risk prevention of the company that provides its services in it.
General procedures to follow in all cases
As we have already stated in previous posts, the mother must communicate the pregnancy situation in all cases where decisions are made that imply changes in the prevention of risks for pregnancy, the fetus or for periods during breastfeeding.
All the risk factors presented here, they are general factors and there are many more given that each person may have a specific condition and the performance of their job may generate risks not contemplated in this case.
The prevention services together with the doctors of the Accident Mutual are responsible for verifying each of the jobs, perform a thorough analysis of it and take the necessary measures so that the pregnancy is not altered by any work circumstance. Facing any kind of doubt, suspend work as the first advice and resort to those responsible for the company.
