What Injuries At Work Are RIDDOR Reportable?

RIDDOR applies to every business. RIDDOR stands for the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations, and it's a legal requirement.

If you have an accident, incident, illness, disease or other dangerous event, you should check if it needs reporting under RIDDOR. Deaths at work are always reportable.

RIDDOR reportable injuries, deaths, diseases and certain other events must be reported (usually online) within specific timeframes.

But not all accidents must be reported - but serious or significant accidents almost always should be. If it requires time off work, it will probably be reportable.

And it's not just injuries that you need to report. Sometimes you'll need to report events where no one got hurt.

Confused? Let's clear things up, and take a look at what's reportable under RIDDOR.

• Deaths
• Major injuries
• 7-day injuries
• Injuries to the public
• Reportable Diseases
• Reportable Dangerous Occurrences

RIDDOR Reportable Injuries

Ok, let's start with injuries since that's by far the biggest reportable category under RIDDOR. This section will cover the first four items on our list:

• Deaths
• Major injuries
• 7-day injuries
• Injuries to the public

But first, for an injury to be reportable under RIDDOR, it must satisfy certain criteria.

1. The accident must be RIDDOR reportable
2. The injury must be RIDDOR reportable

Is the accident RIDDOR reportable?

Firstly, the injury must be the result of a RIDDOR reportable accident. This means that the accident causing the injury must be work-related.

Accidents outside of work are not reportable. For example, if a worker was injured at home and the injury resulted in over 7 days off work, it wouldn't be RIDDOR reportable because it didn't happen at work.

Under RIDDOR, an accident is defined as a separate, identifiable, unintended incident, which causes physical injury. An injury or illness resulting in time off work is only reportable if there is an identifiable event that caused the injury - for example lifting a heavy object, or an object striking someone.

Injuries or illnesses at work that are not the result of a workplace accident would also not be reportable under RIDDOR.

For example, if someone has a heart attack at work, it wouldn't be RIDDOR reportable - even if they die - if it's not the result of an accident at work.

Is the injury RIDDOR reportable?

Once you have established a work-related accident has resulted in an injury, there are then several types of reportable injuries under RIDDOR.

• Deaths
• Major injuries
• 7-day injuries
• Injuries to the public

Where injuries are reportable, the HSE must be notified by the appropriate means, usually via the online form. In some cases, the report may be made via telephone. We cover how to report under RIDDOR in a separate post, but first, let's take a more detailed look at what injuries are reportable.

Deaths

This one is fairly straightforward. Fatalities at work are almost always going to be RIDDOR reportable - providing they are the result of a workplace accident.

6.—(1) Where any person dies as a result of a work-related accident, the responsible person must follow the reporting procedure.

All deaths of workers and non-workers arising from a work-related accident are reportable under RIDDOR. This also includes deaths that occur within one year following an accident at work, where this is the cause of death.

For example, if someone hit their head at work, and is sent to the hospital, this might be reported as a major injury. If they die months later from their injury, then this would need to be reported again as a work-related fatality under RIDDOR.

Major injuries

Major injuries at work are reportable under RIDDOR. But how do you know exactly what is classed as a major injury?

Well, RIDDOR includes a list of specified injuries that need to be reported as major injuries. These types of injuries include fractures, amputations, serious burns and loss of consciousness.

1. Bone fractures (other than to fingers, thumbs and toes)
2. Amputation of arm, hand, finger, thumb, leg, foot or toe
3. Any injury causing permanent blinding or reduction in sight to one or both eyes
4. Any crush injury to the head or torso causing damage to the brain or internal organs
5. Any burn injury covering more than 10% of the body or causing damage to the eyes, respiratory system or vital organs
6. Any scalping requiring hospital treatment
7. Loss of consciousness caused by head injury or asphyxia
8. Any injury from work in an enclosed space leading to hypothermia or heat-induced illness, or requiring resuscitation or admittance to hospital for more than 24 hours

Injuries lasting more than 7 days

RIDDOR requires 7-day injuries to be reported. This means that you need to report injuries resulting in a person being off work (or unable to perform their normal work duties) for more than 7 consecutive days.

(2) Where any person at work is incapacitated for routine work for more than seven consecutive days (excluding the day of the accident) because of an injury resulting from an accident arising out of or in connection with that work, the responsible person must send a report to the relevant enforcing authority in an approved manner as soon as practicable and in any event within 15 days of the accident.

You get a bit of extra time to report these types of injuries, as you are unlikely to know if someone will be off for seven days until seven days after the accident! However, you should report as soon as possible, for example, if they get a doctor's note earlier, or it's fairly obvious they will be off work for a while.

Injuries to members of the public

If a member of the public is injured as a result of your work activities and gets taken to the hospital for treatment, this needs to be reported under RIDDOR, if:

• They are injured in a work-related accident
• They are taken to hospital for treatment

It doesn't need to be a major injury - when a member of the public is injured, reporting requirements apply to any type of injury - but only where they get taken to hospital for treatment.

This only applies where there is an injury, and the person is taken to the hospital to treat that injury. There is no need to report incidents where people are taken to hospital purely as a precaution when no injury is apparent.

Now we have discovered the types of injuries that need to be reported. But RIDDOR covers more than just the reporting on injuries. We have only covered RI (reporting of injuries) so far. Let's look at what else needs to be reported under RIDDOR.

RIDDOR Reportable Diseases

Under RIDDOR, employers and self-employed people must report diagnoses of certain occupational diseases where these are likely to have been caused or made worse by their work.

Reportable diseases under RIDDOR are listed in regulations 8 and 9 of the regulations. Types of occupational diseases include occupational dermatitis, hand-arm vibration syndrome, occupational cancer etc.

• Carpal Tunnel Syndrome from using percussive or vibrating tools
• Cramp in hand or forearm from prolonged periods of repetitive movement of fingers, hands or arms
• Occupational dermatitis from exposure to known skin sensitisers or irritants
• Hand Arm Vibration Syndrome from regular use of percussive or vibrating tools or materials
• Occupational asthma from exposure to respiratory sensitisers
• Tendonitis or tenosynovitis in the hand or forearm from frequent repetitive movements
• Diagnosis of cancer attributed to occupational exposure
• Any disease attributed to occupational exposure to a biological agent

RIDDOR Reportable Dangerous Occurrences

So far, we've needed to report people getting hurt, either through injury or harm to their health.

But you might also need to report certain events where no one suffered any harm. We call these dangerous occurrences.

Several types of dangerous occurrences require reporting in circumstances where the incident has the potential to cause injury or death, such as the collapse of lifting equipment or scaffolding, unintentional explosions, accidental release of hazardous substances or gas, accidental contact with overhead power lines etc.

Like a near-miss, no one got hurt - but they could have been.

Dangerous occurrences include:

• Collapse, overturning or failure of any load-creating part of lifting equipment
• Failure of any closed vessel or associated pipework forming part of pressure systems
• Contact or electrical discharge between overhead electric lines and plant or equipment
• Electrical incidents causing an explosion or fire resulting or stoppage of plant for more than 24 hours or significant risk of death
• Unintentional explosion or ignition of explosives, including misfires and failure of shots to cause a demolition
• Any accident or incident that could have resulted in the escape of high-risk biological agents
• The malfunction of radiation generators and radiography equipment
• The malfunction of breathing apparatus with a significant risk of personal injury
• The failure, damage or endangering of life or significant risk of personal injury during diving operations
• The complete or partial collapse of scaffolding
• Train collisions which could have caused death or specified injury to any person
• A blow-out, unanticipated detection of hydrogen sulphide, mechanical failure or additional precautionary measures in relation to wells
• Any damage to, uncontrolled release, failure of isolation or failure of equipment in pipelines or pipeline works

Some extra dangerous occurrences need to be reported when working in a mine, quarry, railway and transport systems and offshore workplaces. Make sure you take a look at schedule 2 of the RIDDOR regulations if this applies to you.

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For more information on RIDDOR, you can take our RIDDOR eLearning course. On successful completion of the course, you can download a certificate for your training records.