1992 Occupational Injuries and Illnesses by Selected Characteristics — 1994-04-26

Serious sprains and strains accounted for about 1 million of the 2.3 million work-related injuries and illnesses that required recuperation away from work in 1992. About one-fifth of these sprains, which were mostly to the back, resulted in relatively lengthy absences from work of about 6 weeks or more per case, according to new findings from a national survey of work-related injuries and illnesses in private industry by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor. The 1992 results announced today present the first national data on the characteristics of serious nonfatal injuries and illnesses, for example, the demographics of workers disabled, the nature of the disabling condition, and the event and source producing that condition. The number and frequency of such cases were initially reported from the BLS 1992 Survey of Occupational Injuries and Illnesses in December 1993.