It’s a pop quiz style risk roundup this week where you can match wits with the riskmeisters. The Notwithstanding Blog hosts the Cavalcade of Risk #149: Single Best Answer edition.
In other matters, we will use this week’s roundup here at Workers Comp Insider to highlight some useful gizmos and gadgets that have been accumulating in our bookmarks folder: a grab bag of work-related mobile apps and calculators that we hope you’ll find useful!
There’s an app for that
DOL data apps – Backed by prize money, last summer the Department of Labor issued an Occupational Employment Statistics challenge to developers to use DOL data in innovative, creative, and useful ways that would empower job seekers and consumers. Winning apps were recently announced – they include job trackers and occupational wage watchers – but our favorite is Eat Shop Sleep, an app that allows you to geographically shop for hotels and restaurants, and to narrow your results based on health and labor violations, as well as local reviews.
The DOL itself offers a few mobile apps – a labor statistics tool, a timesheet, and an OSHA heat safety tool. See the full menu of USA.gov features various mobile apps – a few that look particularly helpful include PTSD Coach, MedlinePlus Mobile, and U.S. Federal per-diem rates. And we can’t resist pointing out the MEanderthal, a Smithsonian app that allows you to upload a photo and morph into a neanderthal – not particularly work-related, unless you want to create an unusual portrait bulletin board for your work team. (See a fun video of MEanderthal in action).
Accessibility App – Another app development challenge sponsored by the Knight Foundation and the Federal Communications Commission yields a tool with great potential for people with disabilities. Access Together, is a crowd-sourced Foursquare-style app, which incorporates user information about accessibility of various locations. All answers will be saved and become part of a searchable dataset, map and open API to be used by people with and without disabilities.
Distracted Driving – DriveSafe.ly is a mobile application that reads text (SMS) messages and emails aloud in real time and automatically responds without drivers touching the mobile phone. DriveSafe.ly bills itself as “the solution to texting while driving.” It’s available in either a personal or a business/enterprise edition.
Calculators
Push Pull Carry Calculator – Canada’s WorkSafeBC is a great source of quality health and safety resources. Check out the Push Pull Carry Calculator, a tool designed to help prevent musculo-skeletal injuries.
Ergonomics Cost Benefit Calculator – The Puget Sound Chapter of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society has developed an Ergonomics cost-benefit calculator that helps you to estimate ROI by comparing three intervention options that offer estimates of benefits and payback periods.
Diabetes cost – The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) has created Diabetes Cost Calculator for Employers, an evidence-based tool that employers can use to estimate how much diabetes costs them and the potential savings that would result from better management of diabetes. In a similar vein, see Blueprint for health, a free web-based tool for making value-based decisions for health and productivity management. This tool was developed by the Health as Human Capital Foundation in collaboration with ACOEM, and the National Business Coalition on Health (NBCH).
R.O.I. – Wellness Return on Investment Calculators are designed to help you to estimate the effect that a good wellness programs can have on health care costs, absenteeism, and presenteeism. For another tool variation on the theme of wellness program ROI, see the Calculate your Savings.
The cost of doing nothing – Quantifying the Cost of Physical Inactivity Calculator estimates the financial cost of physically inactive people to a particular community, city, state or business. The site also provides companion resources and information to re-allocate resources and plan for healthier workplaces and communities that are more supportive of physical activity.