"Hurry up! Call an ambulance!" "I hope he's alright. This is the third accident in the warehouse this year. There's gotta be something wrong with our safety program. Is anybody in management paying attention?" You and your employer have a powerful tool for making your facility a safer place to work. It's OSHA's injury and illness record keeping system. Often referred to as part 1904, after it's federal regulation part number. In addition to establishing a standard method for recording work-related injuries and illnesses, part 1904 allows your employer to easily create statistics on any incidents that occur at your facility. These statistics help them to identify problem areas within your facility and to correct any hazardous conditions that exist. Part 1904 also gets you more involved in the recordkeeping process. First, by requiring that the annual summary of workplace injuries and illnesses must be posted so that you may examine it. Second, it protects the privacy of injured and sick workers by requiring that highly personal information such as the identities of individuals, or detailed information on sensitive conditions, such as genital infections be kept confidential. There's a bigger picture here too. On a national level, OSHA relies on the data that companies like yours collect. Without this data, OSHA would have a much more difficult time determining when a new regulation was necessary or existing regulations needed to be modified. And without appropriate regulations, workers just like you might not be protected from serious injuries or even death. But in order for this record keeping system to be successful, you have to be involved. You and your representatives play a crucial role in complying with part 1904, because you are the eyes and ears of the recordkeeping system. That's why you need to know how to report injuries or illnesses to management, as well as what information to give them. To encourage your participation, OSHA prohibits employers from discriminating against anyone who reports a work-related fatality, injury or illness, file safety and health complaints, asks for appropriate access to health records, or exercises any other rights afforded by part 1904. How do you know if you're affected by these regulations? Employees protected by the OSHA record keeping rule include everyone on your company's payroll. Whether they are classified as labor, executive, hourly, salary, part-time, seasonal, contract, freelance or migrant. Certain types of businesses are exempt. But if you're watching this program, it's a good bet that your business is covered. As we've said, you play an indispensable role in OSHA's recordkeeping system. And there are some important things that you need to remember as you do your part. For example, recording or reporting a work-related injury, illness or fatality, does not mean that an OSHA rule has been violated, or that any particular person was at fault. Neither does this rule determine who is or isn't eligible for workers' compensation or other benefits. The sole intent of the OSHA recordkeeping rule is to make your workplace safer by providing a way to efficiently report and record work-related injuries or illnesses. But what does this term work-related really mean?