August 26, 2022
Ergonomic flooring is an innovative workplace solution that improves employee health, morale, and productivity.
We created this post to explain everything you need to know about ergonomic flooring — what ergonomic floors are, the benefits of ergonomic flooring, and how it can improve workplace conditions in various applications.
What Is Ergonomic Flooring?
According to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), ergonomics is the art of fitting the work to the worker to help workers stay healthy and reduce or eliminate the risk of work-related injuries such as musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs). People who work in physically demanding industries — healthcare, hospitality, and general manufacturing, to name a few — are most at risk for developing MSDs such as tendinitis and lower back injuries. Ergonomic flooring can significantly reduce this risk by providing a softer surface to walk and stand on.
Benefits of Ergonomic Flooring Materials
Ergonomic flooring helps improve the experience of employees and customers in a variety of industries. The top benefits of ergonomic flooring include:
- Comfort: Ergonomic floors are soft and flexible underfoot, providing a more comfortable working environment for workers in physically demanding jobs.
- Productivity: Discomfort and pain negatively impact employee performance, damaging your organization’s overall productivity. Installing anti-fatigue flooring reduces tiredness and work-related MSDs, letting your employees work longer with less pain.
- Noise reduction: Ergonomic flooring is soft, helping it absorb percussive sounds like footsteps, machine vibrations, and conversation. Dampening loud noises creates a more productive environment by eliminating distractions and reducing stress-inducing sounds.
- Increased morale: By improving comfort and absorbing excess sound, ergonomic flooring boosts employee morale and, for public-facing industries, creates a pleasant customer experience.
- Safety: Ergonomic flooring reduces the risk of developing musculoskeletal disorders, but it has other properties that can make your environment more conducive to employee safety. Slip-resistant ergonomic floors lower the risk of employees falling on the job.
- Cost savings: When you reduce the risk of workplace injuries, you can save your organization money on health-related expenses such as workers’ compensation and employee absenteeism. Combined with increased productivity, your organization’s profitability could grow significantly.
Industries That Require Ergonomic Floors
Potential applications for ergonomic flooring are endless. The industries that most benefit from ergonomic flooring include:
- Healthcare: Ergonomic floors for hospitals strike a perfect balance between comfort and safety in healthcare environments. Doctors, nurses, and other healthcare professionals spend most of the day standing during medical procedures and walking between appointments, so having a flexible surface underfoot helps them maintain some of their energy. Additionally, the noise dampening ability of ergonomic flooring reduces stress for patients, facilitating the healing process.
- Pharmaceutical: Pharmaceutical labs require sterile conditions to protect researchers from pathogens and enable them to develop safe, effective medications. Seamless ergonomic floors are highly sanitary and easy to clean, making them an excellent choice for laboratory environments.
- Education: Students — and instructors — need a distraction-free environment. Ergonomic floors absorb sound, helping learners remain focused on course material. They also help instructors maintain student engagement by letting them stand in front of the class and move through the room with ease for the duration of the lesson.
- Retail: Ergonomic flooring improves the shopping experience for customers by reducing noise and providing a comfortable, aesthetically appealing surface to walk on. Additionally, the low maintenance needs of ergonomic floors make it easy for store employees to keep their workplace looking clean and fresh even during high traffic periods.
- Hospitality: Whether they’re waiting tables or cleaning hotels, workers in the hospitality industry spend most of the day on their feet. Slip-resistant ergonomic flooring boosts productivity by enabling employees to move quickly without worrying about falling and getting injured, while the flexible material fights fatigue.
Ergonomic Resinous Flooring Options
Resinous flooring — also frequently called seamless or epoxy flooring — is a type of poured flooring system consisting of multiple layers. Each layer serves a specific purpose, creating a system designed to perfectly meet the demands of each use case.
At Dur-A-Flex, we strive to develop high-quality flooring systems for every industry — Accelera® RXC, our ergonomic flooring option, is one of the newest additions to our lineup.
Accelera® RXC
While we designed the Accelera® RXC system specifically to meet the needs of the healthcare industry, it can also benefit businesses in other sectors.
In addition to its ergonomic properties, the following features make Accelera® RXC an excellent choice for any environment that experiences heavy foot traffic:
- Low maintenance: Accelera® RXC’s seamless design removes the hard-to-clean cracks and surfaces that harbor harmful pathogens and debris. Additionally, the long-lasting finish requires less frequent polishing and upkeep than more traditional flooring options.
- Hygienic: In addition to being easy to clean, Accelera® RXC is highly chemical-resistant — in testing, it demonstrated that it could withstand the rigorous sterilization protocols required by the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries. As a result, the system is ideal for controlled environments like cleanrooms and biosafety labs, which must be able to handle routine sanitization from harsh chemicals.
- Durable: We specifically tested Accelera® RXC for strength — with high impact resistance, tensile strength, and rolling load, this system can handle the demands of busy hospitals as well as laboratories with specialized equipment.
- Visually appealing: We wanted to help healthcare businesses create more welcoming environments, so we partnered with designers to create two new decorative vinyl chip blends. The system is also UV-resistant, so your chosen colors will remain vibrant for many years to come.
- Sound dampening: Accelera® RXC’s ability to reduce noise lets care providers and researchers work in a distraction-free environment. This property also softens the noise of a busy hospital, reducing stress on patients and facilitating a more effective healing process.
- Slip-resistant: Accelera® RXC’s textured top coat creates a safer floor for people who need to move quickly while on the job by significantly reducing the risk of slipping and falling. Slip-resistant flooring is a beneficial choice for various businesses, from restaurants to hospitals to manufacturing plants.
- Easy installation: Our flooring systems are developed to cure at an accelerated rate with fewer installation steps, helping businesses minimize downtime and get back to service faster.
Install Ergonomic Flooring With Dur-A-Flex
At Dur-A-Flex Inc., we strive to provide our customers with innovative, high-quality flooring systems that will last for years to come. Reach out to your local Dur-A-Flex sales representative today to tell us about your project and get more information on working with us.