DYNAMICS OF SPORT LEGAL ISSUES

ARE YOU LEGAL? PART 1: HEALTH AND SAFETY IN SPORTS THERAPY

BY EILEEN BARON, SPORTS MASSAGE PRACTITIONER

THE PROBLEM OF KEEPING UP TO DATE When did you train for your particular specialism? If it was more than a couple of years ago then it is likely that much of the legislation you were told about has changed. You might focus on working within your scope of practice, but are you actually conforming to current legislation? We become creatures of habit and sometimes we need some form of refresher to remind us of our roles and responsibilities as practitioners. But reading about legislation is “dry” – it is not the most stimulating of subjects and it can be a chore for the practitioner to trawl through reams of documents in an attempt to find out what should and should be done. Part 1 of this article attempts to pick out the issues that are applicable to your everday practice in terms of health and safety, putting it all into the context of sports massage. Hopefully this information will make you think and may even give you some ideas for improving your current practice. It is important to note that legislative

law is not always the same in Scotland as it is in England and Wales, although it is parallel in many instances. The Treaty of Rome forms the basis of European Economic Community (EEC) law and provides for European law to supersede National laws. This means that British laws are constantly being altered to incorporate EEC law as it is developed – all the more reason for keeping up to date with new developments.

COMPLIANCE WITH HEALTH AND SAFETY LEGISLATION When running any type of business,

www.sportEX.net

Health and safety legislation changes rapidly. If your formal training did not take place within the last couple of years, you will probably be out of date already. It is up to you to keep your knowledge about legal issues within sports therapy as current as possible, and that is the overall intention of this two-part article, Part 1 focuses on health and safety. Part 2, which will appear in the next issue, examines issues surrounding insurance and environmental and data protection, as well as trading and fire regulations. We will be looking at this from a UK perspective, but if you subscribe to sportEX from outside the UK your country will have similar legislation. Wherever you operate, ignorance of the law is no defence.

as an employee or self-employed individual, it is essential to comply with legislation and the law. This is a legal requirement which, if ignored, could result in fines or closure of a business. Laws and legislation are put in place to protect the general public, as well as yourself and all employees. Everyone is responsible for health and safety to varying degrees, not just the owner or manager, and the laws surrounding health and safety are constantly being updated. For up-to- date information, leaflets and guidance on health and safety go to the Health and Safety Executive website on www.hse.gov.uk.

A full understanding of the laws and

how they apply specifically to yourself, as a sports massage practitioner, will require some personal research. It is very important to do this because failure to comply with the legislation can have serious consequences, not least among them: claims by injured parties, prosecutions, fines, closure of the business or loss of trade through bad publicity.

HEALTH AND SAFETY IN THE SPORTS MASSAGE INDUSTRY

The main health and safety legislation that directly influences sports therapy practitioners is summarised in Box 1.

HEALTH AND SAFETY AT WORK ACT 1974 Under this Act you are required to ensure the health and safety of yourself

BOX 1: HEALTH AND SAFETY LEGISLATION AFFECTING SPORTS THERAPY PRACTITIONERS

n Control of Substances Hazardous to Health (COSHH) 1999

n Health and Safety at Work (HSW) Act 1974 n Health and Safety (First Aid) Regulations 1981 n Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1992

n Manual Handling Operations Regulations 1992 n Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) Regulations 1992 n Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR) 1995

n Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992

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