The most common restaurant injuries happen when we don’t expect them. An employee goes to work in the morning and ends up sleeping in the hospital. It could be a crack on the head after a slip-and-fall, a deep cut from a chef’s knife, a devastating burn injury or any number of other catastrophic wounds.
Let’s take a quick look at the typical kinds of restaurant worker injuries that tend to trigger a workers’ compensation claim:
Lacerations and puncture injuries: When someone uses knives, dishes, and glassware on a regular basis, it increases the likelihood of cuts and punctures. It’s vital that workers treat these injuries immediately or they run the risk of getting infections. Also, in the case of a deep wound that involves profuse bleeding, workers need immediate emergency room treatment.
Burn injuries: Kitchen workers who deal with fryers, frying pans, stovetops and boiling water on a regular basis also run the risk of serious burn injuries. Approximately 12,000 suffer burn injuries in restaurants each year, but these are only the ones that are serious enough to be reported.
Strain and sprain injuries: It’s difficult to reach certain items in restaurants, and overreaching can result in a sprain, a slip or a fall. Slippery surfaces can also result in slips, trips, and falls. Servers and kitchen staff are all vulnerable to these kinds of injuries — which is why restaurants need to use nonslip floor treatments to prevent these kinds of issues.
Eye injuries: In addition to burning injuries, eye injuries can also happen as a result of splattering grease and splashes or flying objects during the cooking process.
It’s important for the owners of restaurants to provide safety training to all employees to limit the risk of injury. They should also require employees to use nonslip shoes, wear protective equipment and take other injury-prevention precautions. In addition, there are a variety of things restaurants can do in terms of having on-site safety equipment, maintaining properly working tools and more to dramatically reduce the chances of injury or death.
If you were hurt while working at a restaurant, learn more about your legal rights and options under Georgia workers’ compensation law. This knowledge could help you pursue financial compensation to pay for your medical care and more.