All you need to know about MSD Pro, the french national MSD prevention program
To raise awareness of professional risk prevention and prevent the onset of Musculoskeletal Disorders (MSD) in the workplace, “Assurance Maladie” (French national institute of health insurance) has set up a national program called “MSD Pro”. This helps companies of all sizes to initiate an effective professional health and safety program to fight MSDs. What is MSD Pro, why get involved and how to use it?
Moovency has put the program through its paces to give you a comprehensive overview.
What exactly is MSD Pro?
Launched in 2014, by “Assurance Maladie’s” professional risks branch, the MSD Pro program offers a prevention approach against Musculoskeletal Disorders. The program aims to provide each company with tools tailored to its situation to initiate and support an MSD prevention project.
MSD Pro also offers financial assistance, MSD Pro Diagnostic, which can be used to finance training and assessment initiatives to prevent musculoskeletal disorders in the workplace.
Here are the details of all these schemes.
There are two levels to the MSD Pro program:
- Firstly, this program is open to all companies, whatever their size or sector of activity. To consult the offers, please visit the following link: https://www.ameli.fr/loiret/entreprise/sante-travail/risques/troubles-musculosquelettiques-tms.
- Secondly, this program is reserved for targeted companies. These companies benefit from specific and reinforced support. MSD Pro provides them with a private online space where they can access their dashboard to track their prevention actions. Several features were considered when selecting beneficiaries: the company’s sector of activity, the existence of MSD risks and the presence of an activity highly prone to MSDs. Nearly 8,000 of French companies have access to a personalized program.
MSD Pro: financial assistance to assess and reduce MSD risk
MSD Pro includes financial assistance to help companies meet their MSD prevention costs. Depending on the number of employees and the company’s needs, the program provides occasional financial assistance or a grant to finance part of the purchase of equipment, training and services related to MSD prevention.
The “Assurance Maladie” can finance up to €25,000 of their prevention expenses.
To find out how to unlock these funds, or to get support from our ergonomists for your MSD Pro project, we’ve put together a comprehensive memo on grants to finance your prevention actions.
Why call on MSD Pro?
Musculoskeletal disorders are the leading cause of absenteeism in the workplace. It is one of the most common professional illnesses: 87% of sick leave is due to MSDs. Every year, MSDs cost an estimated €21,000. This corresponds to 150 to 300 days’ sick leave per MSD per year.
With an annual prevention plan that takes account of the problem of MSDs, we can observe improved efficiency and productivity, good social cohesion within the team and a significant drop in the absenteeism rate.
In other words, companies have every interest in initiating an MSD prevention program, both for their own sake and to improve the quality of working life conditions (QWL) of their employees. And that’s just what the MSD Pro program is there for!
How MSD Pro works: the 4 stages of the program
If you want to get started in the fight against MSDs, MSD Pro provides you with a comprehensive methodology and tools to make your life easier.
Stage 1: Diagnose your situation
The first stage is to ask yourself the right questions to decide whether you need to commit to a more advanced prevention approach.
This involves doing an overview of your situation and gathering your key indicators to understand the occurrence of MSDs in your company. The most important data to collect is those relating to employee health, and those which have a negative impact on your company’s performance.
Stage 2: Identify your resources
During the diagnosis, we look at what internal resources we have, both human and material. This will enable you to determine your needs, identify priority situations and apply for MSD Pro Diagnostic financial assistance.
To ensure the success of your project, we advise you to involve your teams in your MSD prevention initiative as early as possible. Internal communication plays a key role in uniting teams and promoting your occupational health and safety initiatives.
Stage 3: Implement preventive actions
This stage consists of analyzing priority situations, i.e. those most at risk, in terms of MSDs, and then implementing a prevention plan and concrete actions in the field. This involves adapting workstations and reviewing the company’s internal organization to ensure that daily work is as stress-free as possible for operators.
Step 4: Evaluate results
Once the actions have been completed, it’s time to measure and evaluate the prevention process to ensure that the objectives have been achieved. To do this, it is essential to define the indicators to be measured and monitored over time. These are specific to each company, depending on its needs and challenges.
At Moovency, we advise our customers not to choose too many indicators. We recommend choosing two indicators – and, if necessary, two sub-indicators. For example:
- A health-oriented indicator: absenteeism rate, KIMEA score, exposure time to pathogenic areas subject to excessive stress, etc.
- A performance-oriented indicator: (sales, customer satisfaction, etc.)
Do you need a diagnosis or personalized support to prevent MSDs in your company? We have tailor-made solutions for you.