Pre-placement or pre-employment physical assessments are procedural measures that screen candidates for required abilities (e.g., safe lifting). Such rules do not remove the hazard (elimination), replace it (substitution), or redesign equipment (engineering); they simply manage exposure through policies—an administrative control in the hierarchy of risk control.

A. Engineering controls redesign the physical environment; assessments are paperwork, not engineering changes.

B. Substitution replaces the hazard with something safer; no replacement occurs here.

C. Elimination removes the hazard entirely; the job’s lifting requirement remains.

1. Canadian Centre for Occupational Health & Safety (CCOHS). “Hierarchy of Hazard Controls,” Administrative Controls section, para. 3. (2022).

2. University of Alberta, OHS 458 course notes, Module 4, p. 7: “Pre-employment medicals are an administrative control.”