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Loss of Consciousness
Question:
An employee returns to the office after a week of work-related travel. Upon entering the restroom, the employee loses consciousness. Colleagues point out that the employee had not been eating well while traveling and might be dehydrated. Is it recordable?
Answer:
YES. The incident is presumed work-related and there is evidence the event was caused or contributed to by the work travel. Loss of consciousness is a category of recordable incident. If the incident is solely due to a non work-related issue, then it would not be considered work-related or recordable.
1904.7(a) Basic requirement. You must consider an injury or illness to meet the general recording criteria, and therefore to be recordable, if it results in any of the following: death, days away from work, restricted work or transfer to another job, medical treatment beyond first aid, or loss of consciousness. You must also consider a case to meet the general recording criteria if it involves a significant injury or illness diagnosed by a physician or other licensed health care professional, even if it does not result in death, days away from work, restricted work or job transfer, medical treatment beyond first aid, or loss of consciousness.
1904.5(a) Basic requirement. You must consider an injury or illness to be work-related if an event or exposure in the work environment either caused or contributed to the resulting condition or significantly aggravated a pre-existing injury or illness. Work-relatedness is presumed for injuries and illnesses resulting from events or exposures occurring in the work environment, unless an exception in ยง1904.5(b)(2) specifically applies
Under Section 1904.5(b)(2)(ii), you are not required to record a case if the injury or illness involves signs or symptoms that surface at work but result solely from a non-work-related event or exposure that occurs outside the work environment. For this exemption to apply, the resultant injury must be solely due to the employee's non-work related condition. In other words, an event or exposure in the work environment can play no part in the injury.