2013’s Corporate Safety Reality: Making an Impact with Limited Resources

-By Micah Bongberg Google+ | @annuvia

SAN FRANCISCO, CA – Are we going over the fiscal cliff? Who knows. What we can count on, however, is another year of penny-pinching corporate safety budgets in 2013.

Typically, Fortune 500 corporate safety budgets are closely correlated to a facility’s risk history, not necessarily their risk profile. “On a regular basis, large organizations come to us with a heightened interest and need for AED Defibrillator units after they experience a scare or emergency situation. Unfortunately, the same interest in obtaining CPR classes and first aid training isn’t always as prevalent before the emergency hits,” states Micah Bongberg, President of Annuvia, a national leader in providing large organizations with CPR classes and first aid training courses.

With macro-level fiscal issues at the forefront of everyone’s mind, the natural tendency is to freeze. Freeze budgets. Freeze spending. Freeze existing and even previously-approved safety programs. “At times it feels as though large organizations even prefer the status quo over expending a little effort to research new, cost effective strategies,” says Bongberg. “With advances in technology and new programs like Arch (Annuvia’s AED unit Medical Direction and Oversight software), there are ample opportunities for Big Business to save costs, while increasing protections.”

With strong Good Samaritan liability protections available across the United States, its important that enterprise-sized organizations take advantage of the AED unit protections already available to them, as opposed to “freezing” and, potentially, losing strong immunities against civil damages. With a couple simple steps, organizations can expend little energy (i.e. expenses) and, perhaps, even cut back from last-year’s expenditures while improving the quality of their AED Defibrillator program.

1. Assess CPR/AED Training needs: Large organizations like Annuvia can provide large, multi-national organizations with CPR/AED and first aid training. One agreement. One invoice. One point of contact. Thus saving time to find and negotiate with varying vendors and gaining benefits due to economies of scale.
2. Current Status of AED units: Are all AEDs operating properly? Are all batteries and electrode pads up-to-date? Have all units been programmed to the latest AHA standards and updated after any recalls. If you aren’t sure of these answers immediately and with complete certainty, you may have a problem. Organizations like Annuvia can help and even include these replacement accessories in your CPR training proposal. You review one agreement and all of your needs are met.

Limited budgets require environmental health and safety (EH&S) managers to think creatively and make due with what they have in place. Its important not to “freeze”, thereby bringing on new risks and exposures that didn’t previously exist. For instance, “freezing” and not training staff in CPR may lead to a loss of Good Samaritan immunity protection. If this is the case, a lawsuit and, worse, fatality at the workplace will be a lot more costly than the price of CPR training.