• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.19-28
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• 2010

Industrial Safety and Health Law (ISH Law) of Japan requires abnormalities identified in evaluations of worker health and working environments are reported to occupational physicians, and employers are advised of measures to ensure appropriate accommodations in working environments and work procedures. Since the 1980s, notions of a risk assessment and occupational safety and health management system were expected to further prevent industrial accidents. In 2005, ISH Law stipulated workplace risk assessment using the wording "employers shall endeavor." Following the amendment, multiple documents and guidelines for risk assessment for different work procedures were developed. They require ISH Laws to be implemented fully and workplaces to plan and execute measures to reduce risks, ranking them from those addressing potential hazards to those requiring workers to wear protective articles. A governmental survey in 2005 found the performance of risk assessment was 20.4% and common reasons for not implementing risk assessments were lack of adequate personnel or knowledge. ISH Law specifies criminal penalties for both individuals and organizations. Moreover, under the Labor Contract Law promulgated in 2007, employers are obliged to make reasonable efforts to ensure employee health for foreseeable and avoidable risks. Therefore, enterprises neglecting even the non-binding provisions of guidelines are likely to suffer significant business impact if judged to be responsible for industrial accidents or occupational disease. To promote risk assessment, we must strengthen technical, financial, and physical support from public-service organizations, encourage the dissemination of good practices to reduce risks, and consider additional employer incentives, including relaxed mandatory regulations.

• Journal of information and communication convergence engineering
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.120-129
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• 2021

In this study, the effect of a telecommunication company's safety management system on workers' safety awareness and safety behavior was empirically verified. The main findings are as follows: First, among the factors of the telecommunication company's safety management system, the management supervisor's capability and level of industrial accident investigations were found to have a significant positive effect on workers' safety awareness. Second, workers' safety awareness was observed to exert a significant positive effect on their safety behavior. Third, among the factors of the telecommunication company's safety management system, the management supervisor's capability and industrial accident investigations were found to have a significant positive effect on the safety behavior of workers. Fourth, although the telecommunications safety management system factors, such as management supervisors' capability and industrial accident investigations, were found to have a positive effect on workers' safety awareness, they had no mediated effect on workers' safety behavior through safety awareness.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.17-24
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• 2022

It was legislated in Korea that the small-sized enterprise with fewer than 50 employees should appoint at least one managing officer in order to improve safety and health of the employees since 2016. Study on the effectiveness of this legislation is hardly found, however. This study tried to evaluate effectiveness of the regulations for appointing the safety and health management officer in small-sized manufacturing companies and make suggestions to improve it. It was done by pairwise comparison between the level of safety and health achievement of 52 companies before and after the legislation. A scorecard system and questionnaires were devised for assessing the level of safety and health achievement and surveying awareness and practice of the regulation in the field. Results from quantitative and qualitative analyses performed in the study confirm that the safety and health achievement score has increased significantly after appointing the managing officer. It is also revealed that the lack of expertise and motivation of the appointed officer would yield pointless outcomes. Recommendations to make it better the effectiveness of the regulation are: to administrate requirements more strictly to be appointed as a safety and health management officer, to revise the curriculum to train the expertise of the appointed officers, and to expand financial support of the government to settle the safety and health management system.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.1-8
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• 2016

This study organizes not only the middle-long term developing plan of safety health education to put emphasis on a manufacturing industry, but also the developing plan of activating the domestic safety health education. On the basis of this study, current safety health education can be developed. To achieve a goal of implementing domestic safety health education, this study is carried out more deeply as follows.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.9-15
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• 2023

The Severe Disaster Punishment Act had recently been established in order to promote safety and health (OSH) management system for severe accident prevention. OSH management system is primarily designed based on risk assessments; however, companies in industries have been experiencing difficulties in hazard identification and selecting proper measures for risk assessments and accident prevention. This study intended to introduce an accident analysis method based on epidemiological model in finding hazard and preventive measures. The accident analysis method employed in this study was proposed by the U.S. Department of Energy. To demonstrate the effectiveness of the accident analysis method, this study applied it to two accident cases occurred in construction and manufacturing industries. The application process and results of this study can be utilized in improving OSH management system and preventing severe accidents.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.55-62
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• 2023

Public institutions have a responsibility to ensure the safety of their employees and the public. One way to do this is to implement a systematic safety inspection system based on risk assessments and continuous improvements. This study developed a systematic safety inspection system for public institutions that are ordered construction projects. The proposed system in this study consists of a three-step process: (1) developing safety grade evaluation tables, (2) preparing and conducting safety inspections, and (3) evaluating and improving safety management grades. The first step is to develop safety grade evaluation tables by analysis and diagnosis of the construction site's work type, disaster statistics, and related laws. The second step is to conduct safety inspections using the developed evaluation tables. The third step is to determine the safety management grade based on the results of the safety inspection, and to improve risk factors found during the safety evaluation. The proposed system was implemented in highway construction projects carried out by public institutions. The results showed that the proposed system has two major effects: (1) reducing accident-related deaths and injuries, (2) improving safety management levels by continuous evaluation and improvement. The proposed system can be utilized in construction projects ordered by public institutions to improve the level of occupational safety and health.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.79-86
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• 2024

Scientific exploration of how occupational health risks relate with occupational illnesses are essential for mitigating health-related issues in industries. This study analyzed the risk scores obtained by occupational health risk assessments at 3,172 manufacturing companies and examined their effects on occupational illness. Statistical analyses revealed that companies with an occupational health manager (scored 89.1 out of 100) had significantly higher activity scores of health management compared to those without (78.2). However, companies with a history of occupational illness (79.1) or those classified as high-risk industries (85.2) had significantly lower activity scores than their counterparts (81.7, 87.3). In addition, regression analyses using factor analysis showed that latent risk factors such as cardiovascular disease/job stress, health management, and musculoskeletal problem significantly influenced the risk of occupational illness. The activity factors such as health management, work environment management, and regulatory complaisance significant impacted the reduction of occupational illness. The findings of this study can be used to improve the occupational health risk assessment method and utilized in effectively managing occupational risks in industries.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.312-318
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• 2018

Objectives: This study is aimed to illustrate the status of the occupational accident rate, fatality rate, and musculoskeletal disorder rate by safety and health management type in workplaces. Methods: In order to analyze the status of the occupational accident rate, fatality rate, and musculoskeletal disorder rate of different safety and health management types in workplaces, selected data from the Occupational Safety and Health Research Institute were used. Results: The occupational accident rate in workplaces where safety and health managers had been appointed was lower than in those where safety and health management was entrusted to other organizations, while the result was the opposite in regards to the fatality rate per 10,000 workers caused by accident. However, the occupational fatality rate per 10,000 workers in workplaces where safety and health managers have other roles was 426% higher than those where safety and health management was entrusted to other organizations. Moreover, the musculoskeletal disorder rate of the workplaces where safety and health managers have other roles was 15% higher than those where health management was entrusted to other organizations. Conclusions: It is necessary to review the effectiveness of systems in which safety and health managers can concurrently engage in other roles.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.33-39
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• 2022

In order to improve the implementation of safety and health education at the site for industrial accident prevention activities, research was conducted to minimize inconvenience and increase utilization by redesigning and developing existing education methods. To date, occupational safety and health education has been conducted without considering the general work characteristics and functional facilities (mechanical, electrical, instrumentation, chemical) of workers (mechanical: turbine, valve, pump, hydraulic system, electrical: generator, breaker, motor, etc.). In particular, plant facilities were classified as mechanical and electrical facilities to improve the methodology for industrial safety and health education for plant maintenance workers. In addition, the "One Page Education Plan" was announced as a learning case because the spread of COVID-19 infectious diseases made it impossible to reduce or control the number of people in all groups and groups. The improvement of this training method will play a major role in improving the effectiveness of safety education in power plant workplaces.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.11-19
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• 2014

Prevention of the disasters is the best welfare to workers and it brings the growth and stability of an enterprise, finally uplifts the national competitiveness. Because small-scale businesses do not have safety and health managers, the government provides a wide range of safety and health management supports to small-scale businesses. However despite of this government's effort, the industrial accident rate of small-scale businesses does not decline, which is mainly because the projects are not differentiated according to the risk level of individual business. Therefore, this paper aims to obtain implications concerning a plan to conduct a reliable assessment of education through a safety job assessment, and to build a framework which may improve a technical area through the AHP analysis.