Moving and Handling Training for Carers: What Must It Include?

Moving and handling training for carers should teach staff how to help people move safely and with dignity, using the right equipment and the individual's handling plan, without putting either person at risk of injury. It should cover the law, how backs get hurt, risk assessment, safe handling principles, hoists and slings, other aids such as slide sheets and bed rails, falls, and the limits of each worker's role. Because it is a physical skill, the knowledge must be followed by an observed practical in your service before anyone is signed off.

This guide is written for registered managers and care providers planning moving and handling of people training for their teams in care homes, nursing homes, home care and supported living.

Why is moving and handling of people training so important?

Helping people move is one of the most common tasks in care and one of the most likely to cause harm when it goes wrong. The Health and Safety Executive identifies moving and handling as a major cause of injury among health and social care workers, especially musculoskeletal injuries to the back and shoulders. For the person being moved, a poor transfer can mean skin damage, a fall, a fracture, pain or simply the loss of confidence and dignity that comes from being handled roughly.

Moving a person is also very different from lifting a box. People are not uniform loads. They may be anxious, in pain, unsteady, or have changing abilities from one hour to the next. Good training recognises that every transfer is a conversation with the person as well as a physical task. 

What does the law say about moving and handling in care?

Several pieces of health and safety law apply. Your staff should understand the main duties in plain terms:

• Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974. Employers must protect the health and safety of employees and others affected by their work, including the people they care for. Employees must take reasonable care and cooperate with their employer.

• Manual Handling Operations Regulations 1992. Employers must avoid hazardous manual handling so far as is reasonably practicable, assess any that cannot be avoided, and reduce the risk. Employees must follow the safe systems of work put in place.

• Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999. Require suitable risk assessments and adequate training for staff.

• Lifting Operations and Lifting Equipment Regulations 1998 (LOLER). Lifting equipment must be suitable and safe, and equipment used to lift people, such as hoists and slings, must be thoroughly examined at least every six months by a competent person.

• Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 (PUWER). Equipment must be suitable, maintained and used only by people who have been trained.

On the care side, Regulation 12 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014 requires providers to assess risks to people's health and safety and to make sure equipment is used safely. Regulation 18 requires staff to have the training they need for their role.

What should moving and handling courses for care workers cover?

Good moving and handling courses for care workers build understanding first, then put it into practice. The knowledge side should help staff to:

• understand how the spine works and how injuries build up over time from poor posture, twisting and repetition, not just from a single lift

Techniques that should never be used

Training should be explicit about unsafe practices that still appear in some services, such as the drag lift, where a worker hooks under a person's armpits to lift them. It puts the worker's back under heavy strain and can injure the person's shoulders and skin. If a person cannot move without that kind of help, the answer is a reassessment and the right equipment, not a stronger pair of arms.

Why is risk assessment at the centre of safe handling?

Every person who needs help to move should have an individual moving and handling risk assessment and a plan that tells staff exactly how to help them. A widely used way to structure the assessment is TILE: the task, the individual capability of the staff, the load (in care, the person being moved) and the environment, with an O sometimes added for other factors such as equipment.

In a care home, that assessment might note that someone needs a full body hoist with a specific sling and two staff for transfers. In home care, it may also need to consider a narrow bathroom, a carpeted floor or whether a family member helps. Training should give staff the confidence to raise concerns when the plan no longer matches what they see, for example after a hospital stay, an illness or a run of falls.

Can manual handling training for carers be done online?

Partly. Online learning is a good way to deliver and test the knowledge: the law, the anatomy, risk assessment, how equipment works and the decisions staff face. It suits busy services because staff can complete it on their phone at a time that fits their shifts, and you get clean, dated records.

What online learning cannot do is show that someone can safely move a real person. Manual handling training for carers is only complete when a competent person has watched them carry out the moves they will actually use, with the equipment in your service, and signed them off. A practical observation should check that the worker:

• reads the handling plan and checks the equipment before starting

• explains the move to the person and gains their consent

• fits and attaches slings correctly and checks them before lifting

• uses slide sheets and other aids without dragging or twisting

• works safely alongside a colleague with clear instructions

• protects the person's dignity and comfort throughout

What does CQC look for?

Inspectors look at whether people are moved safely, whether equipment is right for them and well maintained, and whether staff know what they are doing. They may watch transfers, read care plans and ask staff how they would help a particular person. Evidence they will usually expect includes:

• individual moving and handling assessments that are current and reviewed after changes

• training records for all staff who move people, with refresher dates

• records of observed practical assessments

• LOLER thorough examination reports for hoists and slings, and servicing records

• bed rail risk assessments

• a falls procedure that staff can describe

How often should carers refresh moving and handling training?

Most providers refresh moving and handling training every year, with a fresh practical observation, and this is the approach the CareStream course is built around. It keeps techniques sharp, picks up bad habits before they become routine, and keeps your records in date.

Reassess sooner when you introduce new equipment, such as a different hoist or sling system, when a worker returns from a back injury or long absence, after an incident or near miss, or when someone's needs change in a way the team has not handled before.

The CareStream Moving and Handling of People course

CareStream's Moving and Handling of People course is a CPD Certified Course, certified by The CPD Certification Service and worth 1 CPD hour. It is an annual refresher built on the Skills for Care statutory and mandatory training guide and HSE guidance on moving and handling in health and social care.

CareStream is a registered CPD Provider (No. 50224). You can check our membership and see every CPD-certified course we offer on our page on The CPD Certification Service website.

The eight lessons are:

• The law and guidance

• Your back and how injuries happen

• Risk assessment and handling plans

• Principles of safe handling

• Moving and positioning with dignity

• Hoists and slings

• Other equipment, bed rails and falls

• Your limits and the observed practical

Learners work through interactive activities and scenarios in about an hour, on any phone or computer, in over 60 languages. They then take a 32-question knowledge assessment with an 80% pass mark. Any wrong answer triggers a short follow-up lesson, so the learning gap is closed.

Practical sign-off by you, then the certificate

This course requires an observed practical. The online course covers the knowledge. You, the employer, then observe each learner moving and handling people in practice and sign them off before their certificate is issued. The named, dated certificate carries the CPD mark and evidences completion of CPD Certified training and a passed knowledge assessment. It is not a qualification and does not by itself prove competence; your observation does that.

From the manager dashboard, you allocate licences and track who has finished, their scores and who is awaiting sign-off. Team prices start from 10 licences, with a 14-day refund on any licence not yet started.

Safer moves for everyone

Safe moving and handling protects two people at once: the person being helped and the worker helping them. Clear knowledge, a current handling plan, the right equipment and a practical check in your own setting are what make it work. Refresh it every year, observe your staff doing it, and keep listening when they tell you a plan no longer fits.