October 2018

by David P. Galbraith, Amerisure Mutual Insurance Company

Imagine a futuristic construction environment where employees are individually alerted of a hazardous situation, environment or physical position prior to an accident or injury occurring. Then imagine that, a worker’s level of fatigue can be measured, and the worker can be informed that an immediate behavioral change is required to prevent injury. And it would be even more remarkable, if the worker is warned when he or she is too close to moving equipment, leading edges, or dangerous areas. This type of construction site is closer than you might think.

Wearable technologies are making a significant splash in the market. They present the opportunity to improve safety, reduce injuries, improve efficiencies, and enhance quality of life for construction workers. While this technology is in the early stages of adoption, it shows tremendous promise for companies seeking to improve critical areas that drive efficiency, profitability, and safety.

As construction professionals, you might be asked to provide your opinion on this new technology, see a demonstration at a conference, or participate in a pilot program. These requests will increase as wearable technology becomes more prevalent in the construction sector.

Defining Wearable Technology

An internet search of wearable technology returns thousands of definitions. The definitions apply to various industry sectors including healthcare, manufacturing, and construction. In order to better understand how wearable technology can help contractors achieve their goals, we must define what wearable technologies encompass for the purpose of this article.

Amerisure’s risk management team defines construction wearables in the following way:

Construction wearables are devices, generally including a computer or advanced electronic device, worn on a construction worker’s body/clothing/personal protective equipment, designed to collect and deliver data about the surrounding environment, activities, and biometric conditions. The wearable device attempts to improve the quality of life of the construction worker by identifying and warning the employee about the potential for injury, or reducing the seriousness of an injury should one occur.

Objectives are achieved by providing portable and timely access to sensors, computers and electronics. The emerging access to multifunctional technology, and its ability to collect and analyze relevant data, is revolutionizing worker protection.

How Wearable Technology Can Improve Safety

Wearable technology will realize its varying objectives in numerous ways. For instance devices:

• Can provide audible or vibration alarms to warn workers when they are too close to danger, such as moving equipment or a leading edge.
• May warn an individual of a hazardous physical movement—such as bending, twisting, reaching, or lifting.
• May caution a worker who is nearing exhaustion.
• Can alleviate muscular and skeletal joint stress by assisting with lifting or working overhead.
• In emergency situations, can alert emergency personnel, and lead rescuers to an injured worker’s location.

Types of Wearables

Predictions identify the widespread use of wearable technologies in construction over the next seven to 10 years. Currently, several technology and insurance companies are partnering with contractors to run pilot programs that test various types of wearables.

Typical types of wearables currently being piloted, or in limited use on construction sites, include:

• Visual wearables—wearables that use optical aids in/on glasses, visors, and hard hats to produce images for remote viewers and/or the wearer.Visual wearables can bring value to training, troubleshooting, quality control, and other situations where visual representation of a concept is needed. This type of wearable connects field employees to remote technical/supervisory employees, allowing both parties to view items simultaneously. Sharing/overlaying visual information can enhance instructions, training, and verifying materials. Moreover, field workers’ hands remain free to work, while discussing solutions or working through an issue.
• Tactile wearables—wearables that work as an exoskeleton to increase the user’s strength and durability.Tactile wearables are designed as exoskeletons that provide extra strength or endurance to the wearer. They also limit the force on the wearer’s muscular skeletal frame. Force is constantly monitored and the wearable responds to protect the wearer. The potential for strains, sprains and back injuries can be reduced, while simultaneously increasing a wearer’s capacity and endurance.
• Sensing wearables—wearables that can sense a worker’s biological, environmental and physical conditions. In addition to sensing conditions, the device analyzes data using edge computing, and warns the employee of hazardous situations that can lead to an injury.Sensors come in many forms including badges, actuators, bio sensors, gyro scopes, etc. They record and evaluate a wearer’s physical condition, location and the environment around him or her. These wearables can sense location, impact, motions, temperatures, vital signs and blood gases, while they evaluate and interpret the data to provide actionable information.

  Sensors also can be deployed in numerous configurations that make wearing them simple, easy and unobtrusive. Methods of deployment can include attachments to hard hats, safety glasses or personal protective equipment. Clip-on wearables can be attached to shirts, vests and belts. Edge computers can be contained in wrist bands or clip-on devices. Wearables can also be embedded in the soles of shoes or worn as insoles.

Wearables not only have value for individual workers, they can enhance a company’s ability to manage safety experiences, as well. Most wearables feed data to customizable dashboards, which allows leadership to view and evaluate performance data associated with the entire organization, specific jobsites, job categories, job functions and employees. This data, and subsequent analysis, helps identify specific areas of exposures that have the potential to increase injuries. It also provides the opportunity to alter operations prior to accidents or injuries occurring.

The predictive analytics produced by wearable devices, combined with behavioral changes by employees, and corrective measures by leadership, present new opportunities to significantly reduce injuries to construction workers.

Implementing Wearables in Your Organization

The data an organization desires should determine the wearable technology it chooses. For example, an organization concerned with the stress and strains of heavy overhead work may investigate exoskeleton wearables. Those concerned with material handling exposures may utilize biomechanical wearables. When the location of employees and their physical health is critical, biometric wearables may be more desirable.

One of the easiest ways to introduce wearables to an organization is to participate in a pilot program. Many insurance carriers offer pilots through affiliated agencies. Cost-sharing, brand-recognition, and industry expertise are just a few of the benefits of participation.

The wearables wave is approaching quickly and gathering speed. As jobsite connectivity, data aggregation, and edge computing evolve, wearables will become more prevalent. Every contractor should be actively investigating and evaluating how this wave can enhance their business.

David P. Galbraith is the assistant vice president and risk management technical lead for Amerisure Mutual Insurance Company. He is responsible for the identification, research, development and implementation of risk management technology programs, and associated vendor management.

##