What Counts as a Recordable Injury Under 29 CFR 1904.7

Every entry on an OSHA 300 Log traces back to one paragraph: 29 CFR 1904.7. It sets the general criteria that decide whether a work-related injury or illness belongs on the log at all, before anything about which column it lands in. This guide walks the criteria themselves, the first-aid list that keeps most minor injuries off the log, and three cases worked from start to column.

The general criteria

Paragraph (a) states the rule in one sentence: "You must consider an injury or illness to meet the general recording criteria, and therefore to be recordable, if it results in any of the following: death, days away from work, restricted work or transfer to another job, medical treatment beyond first aid, or loss of consciousness." Any one of those five outcomes is enough on its own. A case doesn't need two of them, and it doesn't need to be severe by any other measure — a single day of restricted duty qualifies exactly as much as a week of it.

• G: Death
• H: Days away from work
• I: Job transfer or restriction
• J: Other recordable cases

The significant-diagnosis conditions

Paragraph (a) adds a sixth path that doesn't depend on days, treatment or consciousness at all. Paragraph (b)(7) names it directly: "Work-related cases involving cancer, chronic irreversible disease, a fractured or cracked bone, or a punctured eardrum must always be recorded under the general criteria at the time of diagnosis by a physician or other licensed health care professional." A cracked rib that needs no treatment and costs no days still goes on the log the moment a physician diagnoses it, because the diagnosis itself is the trigger, not what's done about it afterward.

First aid is a complete list

Medical treatment beyond first aid is one of the five general criteria, which makes the line between the two decide a lot of cases. Asked whether anything else counts as first aid, paragraph (b)(5)(iii) is direct: "No, this is a complete list of all treatments considered first aid for part 1904 purposes." Fourteen items, under paragraph (b)(5)(ii), are the whole list:

Give any treatment not on that list, and the case has had medical treatment beyond first aid, one of the six general criteria on its own. The recordability checker runs a case against this exact list.

Loss of consciousness has no minimum

The sixth outcome in paragraph (a) has no threshold at all. Paragraph (b)(6) answers the question directly: a work-related case is recordable if the worker becomes unconscious, "regardless of the length of time the employee remains unconscious." A few seconds counts the same as an hour.

Two calls this page doesn't make

Before any of the criteria above apply, two questions have to be answered first, and neither is covered here. Whether the injury is work-related at all is 29 CFR 1904.5's question, and whether it's a new case rather than the flare-up of an old one is 29 CFR 1904.6's. This guide, like the checker, starts from the answers to both already settled.

Three cases, worked

A recordable case lands in exactly one outcome column on the OSHA 300 Log: G for a death, H for days away from work, I for restricted work or job transfer, and J for every other recordable case. Three made-up injuries show how the general criteria sort a case into one of those columns, or keep it off the log entirely.

A box cutter nicks a hand. It's cleaned and covered with a bandage, and nothing else is done. Cleaning a wound and covering it are both on the first-aid list above, so none of the general criteria are met — the case isn't recordable at all, and no column applies.

A different employee twists an ankle and is sent back to work the same week on light duty, kept off ladder climbing for three days, which is part of the job every week. That restriction meets the days-away-or-restricted-work criterion, so the case is recordable in column I.

A third employee's cut needs stitches instead of a bandage. Stitches aren't on the first-aid list, so the case has had medical treatment beyond first aid, and it's recordable. It didn't cause a death, didn't keep anyone away from work and didn't restrict anyone's duties, so it falls to the last column: J.

Had either the sprain or the cut instead kept the employee completely off work for a day or more, the case would move to column H rather than I or J. A fatality is the one outcome that always goes in column G. Run a case of your own through the recordability checker to get its column directly. However a case is classified, it's one more entry in the case count the TRIR calculator works from.