Safety Unpacked - Wear and Tear with Amy Morris

What if the way we talk about wear and tear is actually influencing how people think about their bodies, their work and their risk of injury?

In this Safety Unpacked conversation, Alanna Ball and Amy Morris unpack some of the assumptions around physical work, injury and the idea that our bodies inevitably deteriorate through use.

They discuss how medical scans can sometimes reveal changes that are not necessarily connected to pain or injury, and why focusing on symptoms and the individual experience can be more useful than treating an image as the whole story.

The conversation also explores fear, stress, genetics, physical activity and work design, and how workplaces can focus on building physical and mental capacity rather than creating a culture where people are afraid of getting hurt.

​Episode Highlights

• Why the idea of “wear and tear” can influence how we perceive physical work and injury

• How medical scans can identify changes that do not always correspond with pain

• Why symptoms and individual circumstances matter when assessing pain and injury

• The role of genetics, physical activity and capacity in injury risk

• How fear and stress can influence the experience of pain

• Why building resilience can be more useful than trying to eliminate every physical risk

• How work design can support capability, capacity and safer participation

• Why injury prevention needs a more individual and nuanced approach

​

Our bodies are not machines with a fixed expiry date.

Understanding pain and injury requires more than looking at a scan or assuming that physical work will inevitably cause damage. It requires us to consider the individual, their symptoms, their capacity, their environment and the way work is designed.

For safety professionals, that raises an important question: are we designing work to protect people from every possible risk, or are we also helping people build the capacity and resilience to participate safely?

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