The job that you work can hurt your body, especially if you have done the same job for years. Employees in professions ranging from office support staff to commercial drivers can develop repetitive stress injuries from doing the same job task over an extended period of time.
Although people can often ignore the early symptoms of a repetitive stress injury, eventually, the pain and functional limitations these conditions cause will become unignorable. Thankfully, workers’ compensation benefits will support those with repetitive stress injuries related to their jobs.
Not only will making a claim help you get medical care, but it can also protect you from punitive action by your employer as your condition begins to affect your job. How will repetitive stress affect your job performance?
Pain diminishes productivity
Even if you intend to keep working to the best of your ability, the pain that you feel will slow you down and complicate certain aspects of your job. The worst your pain is, the bigger the effect it will have on your job performance.
Many people lose hours of productivity every week because of chronic pain issues. If you don’t inform your employer of your condition, get a proper diagnosis and initiate a workers’ compensation claim, you might eventually face bad performance reviews and run the risk of losing your job because you didn’t report your condition.
You will be at elevated risk of an accident at work
Chronic pain will affect your sleep, which will diminish your cognitive function at work. You could easily make a mistake in judgment or have a difficult time focusing, which leads to an injury or accident.
Beyond that, you may have tried to find different ways to perform certain job tasks to reduce the pain you experience at work. Those workarounds could also increase the possibility of you getting hurt in a different way. Finally, when someone has less strength and range of motion than they usually would, they could make missteps on the job that lead to an injury for themselves or possibly someone else near them.
Getting enough rest and the right medical treatment can help you reduce the impact of a repetitive stress injury on your job performance and daily life.