Headaches, back pain and arthritis cost companies more than $61 billion per annum

Oct 1 2010

SEATTLE, Sept. 30 /PRNewswire/ -- Headaches, back pain, arthritis and other aches distract employees and cost companies more than $61 billion a year in lost productive time, according to a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

For individual companies, the cost is $22,000 a year for a company with 50 workers and $88,000 for a company with a staff of 200 people.

Employers can save billions of dollars in lost productive time each year by providing basic first aid supplies and over-the-counter pain medications in the workplace.

"Companies are often blind to the how much the real cost of minor pains such as headaches and back pains adds up to," said Larry Shaw, CEO of HART Health a national manufacturer and distributor of industrial first aid supplies. "It isn't just the hourly wage you have to pay when an employee struggles to get through the workday with back pain or a headache; it's the value of what they could be producing."

Using a sample of nearly 30,000 working adults, researchers found more than half reported having headache, back pain, arthritis or other muscle pain. Overall, 12.7 percent of the workforce reported lost productive time in a two-week period due to these common pains.

HART Health operates a first aid supply franchise that makes it easy for employers reduce the impact of common pain problems in the workplace.

"The cost of providing high quality commercial grade first aid supplies is very small," said Shaw. "Larger companies get huge returns on the cost of the supplies. Our first aid van service is growing at double digit rates as more companies come to understand the true cost of employees who can't treat common pains and aches while on the job."

HART Health manufactures and distributes proprietary commercial grade versions of common over-the-counter medications, including BackPrin, an acetaminophen pain reducer with caffeine for faster relief, and Proprinal, an extremely popular coated ibuprofen tablet.

"We take the headaches out of the process," said Shaw. "The majority of the $61 billion in lost time is easy for companies to recover by having the right first aid supplies available and our company is growing as a result."

For information, please visit www.harthealthfranchise.com