OCP 303

ERGONOMICS

HAZARDS IDENTIFICATION IN KOLEJ RAFFLESIA

GROUP MEMBERS:

1. MARDHIAH BT MOHD ZAIN 2010227218

2. NOR NABILLAH BT HAMZAH 2010806972

3. NUR’ AFIQAH BT MHD SUBRE 2010697116

4. SITI HAJAR BT RAZALI 2010

5. NOR BAIZURA BT MD JAHI 2010

1.0 WHAT IS HAZARD?

Hazard is something which could be dangerous to human, health or safety or human

plans and reputation (Craine & Mackrell, 2000).

2.0 HOW TO CONTROL

There are four steps on how to control the hazard which are elimination, substitution,

isolation, engineering controls, administrative controls and personal protective clothing and

equipments. The rationale of these steps is for more reliable control measures rather than

measures that are more likely to fail.

3.0 HAZARD IDENTIFICATION AND SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS

Students of Kolej Rafflesia had been given a comfortable home-like apartment with

eight members per house. A room of two consists of 2 beds, 2 garment racks, 2 study table

with a chair and a soft board. Besides, there is also a hallway and a bathroom provided.

We found that it is interesting to evaluate the weaknesses of the designated house

generally caused by design failure, human error and also environmental factors. After making

a thorough observation, experiment and also receiving claim from other students, a list of

hazard had been identified in the house.

3.1 The Hallway

Immediately after entering the house, people will see a square-space hallway with a

shoe racks on side of the door. Two plugs for electrical resources are provided in that area.

Through observation, we identified that the students prefer to place a stand iron board inside

the hallway for their ironing corner.

A hazard had been identified after observing a student unplugged a switch and left it

on the floor while ironing. Because of the carelessness, the student is exposed to a danger of

potentially stepping on the plug. It is recommended that the students keep the unused wire

wisely in a safe place to avoid any mishaps. Besides, placing of water heater in a lower space

near an ironing corner is not suggested as it has the intensity of people accidentally split the

water out. Thus, it makes the floor become slippery and the splatted water may contact with

the maze of plug on the floor.

 Due to the placement of the water heater, it was also pinpointed that student may face

difficulty while pouring the water into the cup. The student had to bend her trunk forward and

prone to the right in order to make sure her vision is directed to the poured water.
 It is advocated to eliminate the water heater from the place and change it to the

waist-level table as it is a frequently used item. It is also advisable for her to lift the jug and

poured the water into a cup place on the table instead of on floor. On the other hand, we

found a faulty switch that was unused. The switch can cause an electrical hazard such as short

circuit and electrical shock. The damage should be reported to the administrator and

appropriate response should be taken.

3.2 Room

Another area which hazard can be found is room area. The hazards that can be seen are

the window in every room and at the hall are not provided with window grill. It may

contribute to danger if the student sits near the window. This is human error as during the

construction, every window at the hostel is not design with the window grills. To overcome

this hazard, the window should be redesign by add window grill at the window.
 Second hazard is source of light from the window. As in the picture, we can see that

the study table is facing the window. The lighting is not good for the student as it can

increased the student’s visual acuity if prolonged reading or using computer in front of the

window. As a solution, the student can closed the window with curtain in order to reduce the

amount of direct sunlight received. Besides that, the student may used vertical blind curtain

and also paste paper on the window as it would decrease the amount of direct sunlight

received.

Another hazard in the room is the rare window. The picture on the above-right shows

the window angle dislodged from the window meanwhile at below-right picture shows a

condition the window should be. As the result, the left window is slanting to the right. It is

risky to the students who are live at downstairs. Therefore, the student needs to make a report

to the hostel administration in order to solve the problem. The technician can change or repair

the window immediately.

 The next hazard is the door in every room. As we know, the college area is always

windy and the door bang always makes sound hazard. Due to the strong wind, the door is

automatically close by itself and produces a loud noise. As a solution, the student placed a

detergent bottle to avoid the door from closed automatically during strong wind. However, it

is not suitable as the detergent bottle is broken when the door is closed with strong power

from the wind. Then, the student used the door stopper for the same problem and it is an

effective solution. Instead of that, the student may recommend to the hostel administration to

redesign the door with hydraulic hinge in order to reduce the noisy.
 Besides that, there is also electrical hazard which found in the student’s room. In the

picture, it has shown that the area of electrical use is in poor position as the extension is place

on the floor and the wires of electrical appliances are quite messy. Furthermore, this habit can

contribute to danger especially when there is water spill around the electrical area. It might

leads to the damage of electrical appliances. So the students in the room are being suggested

to replace the extension at the suitable place and keep the unused electrical appliances

properly. Not only that, students is advised to used their own switched to avoid any crossing

wire that can caused tripping.

The other hazard found is repeated stress on carpal tunnel area which may contribute

to carpal tunnel syndrome. As shown in the picture, the position of the hand during typing

need to be redesign as it will risk the students to have carpal tunnel syndrome. This is because

the edge of the table is sharp and hard which can cause the wrist of the student to feel pain.

For the solution, the student is recommended to use gel pad at the table edge as it may avoid

repeated pressure. Students also suggested using rolled towel and place it under the wrist

while performing prolonged typing.

 Another hazard is from human error. This hazard happen because of the student habit

as the student always placed her leg at the drawer. It can be problem as the door of the drawer

will wreck considering a repetitive weight given to the cabinet. The solution for this problem

is to report to the hostel administration and the student is being advised for not practising the

habit anymore. However, the student is recommended to use thick book and placing it under

her leg to make her comfortable during sitting on the chair.

The other hazard is also human error. In hostel of UiTM Puncak Alam, the students

used the curtain rail to hang over their clothes in order to get direct sunlight to dry their

clothes. This habit is not recommended to the student as it will make the rail broken down

and the student may risk to the danger during hanging their clothes at the curtain rail. In order
to solve the problem, the students need to buy a garment rack to hanging their clothes rather

than hang it at the rail. Besides that, the students may tie a rope at the toilet and hang their

clothes at it.

3.3 The Bathroom

The bathroom consists of mainly 2 shower rooms and one toilet room. There are

also a space for hanging cloth and a table top tile for laundry. Based on the discontentment of

student, the design of shower room is very small and the space is not suitable with majority of

student’s personal space. The cubicle of the shower room makes the reaching, stretching hand

out and kicking space become limited.

 The picture above shows that a student is having difficulty in wiping her body after

taking a bath. She is unable to stretch both arm and make her difficult to change her position

while bathing, wiping and donning garments. She claims that she always got stuck while

switching position and inadvertently hit the pipe. The bathroom too is not providing any rack

for user to place toiletries. Thus, the students usually place their soaps and shampoos on

floor. Through observation, it was seen that the student have to extremely bend downwards in

order to reach the toiletries while bathing. Imagine that bathing activity was done

approximately 2 times per day with toiletries that usually been used are like soaps, shampoos,

face cleanser, toothbrush and etc., and the user have to bend for like twice to place stuff on

floor before bathing, to reach and place back while bathing and also reach the toiletries back
after bathing. This repetitive movement will leads to development of back pain for prolonged

time.

We suggest that, the bathroom have to be redesign to widen the area after consider the

daily used of the toilet. The complaint should be reported to the authorized party for further

action. Besides, in order to prevent repetitive bending, student may place a rack or a hanging

basket inside the bathroom while using it (Knott, 2010).

In another cases, it was found that a student is doing laundry in the bathroom.

Laundry was done using a pail of water whereas the nearest water source is in the bathroom

cubicle mentioned before. When lifting the pail into the bathroom to rinse the cloth, student

needs to perform crab-like movement because the space is too small. Still due to small

spaces, student commonly unable to squat while lifting the heavy pail and taking the easy

way to lift up the pail full of water with trunk bending. Student also complained that she
sometime hit the pipe and former soap on head and hit the door knob on back while lifting the

pail.

To solve the problem, a long hose is recommended so that student does not have to

lift the pail into that small cubicle. Besides, the student should be educating with the

ergonomic way of lifting with correct body posture.

After doing an experiment, it was identified that, apart from inadequate space and

poor body mechanic, slippery floor also become one of the hazardous factors in the bathroom

(Knott, 2010). This is due to the habit of pouring water with soap on floor after laundry. After

a few minutes, the water will dried leaving an alkaline surface of floor that make the

bathroom more slippery. This will leads to possibility of fall.

 It was suggested that the student to rinse the soapy water after doing laundry with the

used of water repellent mop. Apart from that, non-slip mat also can be used on the floor to

reduce the slippery risk on the surface. Student also is advised to use rubber slippers when

entering the bathroom to prevent falling. However, student had to make sure the sole of shoe

has a good grip to increase friction to the floor.

Related to laundry activity, we also found the human error in the bathroom. Due to

insufficient place to hang on cloth, student takes an easy way by hanging the cloth on the

jalousie window.
 This will leads to the possibility of the glass slip downwards and break. The act of

hanging cloth on the glass should be eliminated as it is against the law of work and may cause

any unwanted incidents.