MoveSafe® utilizes three main elements to create a culture of movement awareness and injury prevention. The following video gives an overview to the MoveSafe® Main Elements:
The 3 Main MoveSafe® Elements
1. Prepare and Maintain the Body
This element helps workers understand the importance of preparing their body before starting work and maintaining the body throughout the shift. Whether their job is physical or more sedentary – such as working in an office or operating a piece of mobile equipment – it is critical that workers perform a pre-work Warm Up and take regular Interrupt breaks throughout the shift. Warm Up and Interrupt exercises are not just to ‘get the blood flowing’, the main goal is to reinforce proper motor patterning for healthy posture and movement.
Pre-work Warm-up
All athletes, including industrial athletes, should begin with proper preparation of the body through controlled, dynamic movements that program proper motor patterns that match the physical requirements of the upcoming tasks.
Corrective Exercises
Each worker should have their own body improvement plan with individualized exercises to ensure optimal movement, posture, coordination and stability. The MoveSafe® ‘Improve’ Program has our MoveSafe® Specialists analyze employee posture and movement quality before prescribing appropriate corrective exercises.
Interrupt Breaks
Work that is static, effortful, repetitive or requires awkward postures should be interrupted regularly with simple recovery movements. The MoveSafe® program offers simple movement-specific Interrupt exercises that help tissues recover from the stresses associated with particular tasks and movements.
Discomfort Management
Our MoveSafe® Specialists are certified Athletic or Physical Therapists and are more than qualified to help manage and eliminate any discomfort employees may be having through a guided intervention of therapeutic exercise.
2. Prepare the Work Area, Tools and Equipment
This element focuses on ergonomics and helps workers understand how the fit of their tools and work environment affects their ability to perform healthy movements. MoveSafe® educates workers on the right way to use their body and teaches them to question their work area and equipment if it doesn’t allow them to get into correct postures and positions to perform the work.
Getting people to understand that they can adapt their environment and adapt their tools to reduce physical workload will help them take an active role in injury prevention. This MoveSafe® element teaches the worker how they can control their environment to optimize their body position, posture and movement.
3. Move Safe with the ‘Big 3’
Once your body is prepared to move properly and your work area, tools and equipment are optimized to fit, the final step is for workers to perform healthy movements. The human body is designed to move in some areas and stabilize in other areas. If you use your body in this way, every movement that you make whether at work, home or during leisure activity will make you stronger, fitter and healthier. If you use your body in a way contrary to how it was meant to be used then every movement wears the body down, leading you closer to discomfort or injury.
MoveSafe® has distilled healthy posture and movement into 3 simple principles called the ‘Big 3’. The ‘Big 3’ are:
Stable base
Hinge at the hips
Shoulders anchored
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