Emm-Tech and Queensland Rail

We introduced Debbie Keighran to you in the last issue of Emm-Chat. She is a Remedial Therapist in Townsville, North Queensland who runs an extremely busy practice which is frequented by elite sportspeople and professional athletes. Over the years Debbie has been very active as an Emm-Tech Tutor and now as an Emmett Technique Instructor. Debbie's most recent endeavour has been to commence some exciting work with a pilot program being under¬taken by Queensland Rail as part of their 'Zero Work Injury Policy'. As part of the project, every second Tuesday, Debbie spends her time with the burly 'tradies' in the yards at Queensland Rail in Townsville.

It all started in May when Loco and Wagon Manager, Sean O'Connor, approached Debbie to treat his work force as an initiative to minimise workplace injuries. Queensland Rail have implemented a new injury prevention policy under Occupational Health and Safety which aims to have 'Zero work place injuries' for the year.

When we asked Debbie to describe her contribution to the program, she said she normally spends the time with the staff, completing approximately 30 Emmett consultation/treatments during the day. During a session she typically performs range of movement assessments prior to and following the treatment. Through her methods she has been able to provide generic statistics of complaints back to Queensland Rail which they have then used as the basis of their injury prevention program.

For example: Debbie's report found a significant number of staff in one section were experiencing pain and discomfort to the same muscles in their left arm, requiring the same Emmett Technique corrective moves. With this information, Queensland Rail was able to retrace the departments' processes to discover which particular job task put the left arm in stress and then investigate new ways of approaching this task to ensure the muscles were not at risk or overused.

A group of staff from another department were experiencing a high number of lower back complaints. On receiving this information, the management investigated and discovered that one of the work processes required staff to stand in a pit in a position which put their back under stress. By making the pit deeper, Queensland Rail would be able to ensure the staff were no longer required to hold themselves in that position thus removing the stress from their backs and alleviating the complaint.

Sean O'Connor said that even after investing a great deal of time and money over the years in other programs, this is the first time Queensland Rail have been able to gain this kind of information and they are very excited. The improved health and wellbeing of the staff involved in the program has resulted in great feedback to management on Debbie's treatments.
Needless to say, the impressive benefits of the program to date have ensured that Queensland Rail has not only extended the program indefinitely in Townsville, but they are also considering extending the region to include the Rockhampton and Ipswich Depots. This will no doubt keep Debbie extremely busy - particularly when her teaching schedule has been increased to include a trip out West this month with Karen Mackenzie and Gail Illingsworth to take EmmTech to the bush. Well done Debbie, we look forward to hearing more about this program in the future.