• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.1-8
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• 2015

Time-loss injuries are still a major occurrence in Canada, injuring thousands of Canadian workers each year. With obesity rates on the rise across the country, as well as around the world, it is important that the possible effects of obesity in the workplace be fully understood, especially those effects linked to lost-time injuries. The aim of this paper was to evaluate predictors of workplace lost-time injuries and how they may be related to obesity or high body mass index by examining factors associated with lost-time injuries in the health care sector, a well-studied industry with the highest number of reported time loss injuries in Canada. A literature review focusing on lost-time injuries in Registered Nurses (RNs) was conducted using the keywords and terms: lost time injury, workers' compensation, occupational injury, workplace injury, injury, injuries, work, workplace, occupational, nurse, registered nurse, RN, health care, predictors, risk factors, risk, risks, cause, causes, obese, obesity, and body mass index. Data on predictors or factors associated with lost-time injuries in RNs were gathered and organized using Loisel's Work Disability Prevention Management Model and extrapolated upon using existing literature surrounding obesity in the Canadian workplace.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.25-29
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• 2015

Background: Shift work has been associated with occupational stress in health providers and in those working in some industrial companies. The association is not well established in the law enforcement workforce. Our objective was to examine the association between shift work and police work-related stress. Methods: The number of stressful events that occurred in the previous month and year was obtained using the Spielberger Police Stress Survey among 365 police officers aged 27-66 years. Work hours were derived from daily payroll records. A dominant shift (day, afternoon, or night) was defined for each participant as the shift with the largest percentage of total time a participant worked (starting time from 4:00 AM to 11:59 AM, from 12 PM to 7:59 PM, and from 8:00 PM to 3:59 AM for day, afternoon, and night shift, respectively) in the previous month or year. Analysis of variance and covariance were used to examine the number of total and subscale (administrative/professional pressure, physical/psychological danger, or organizational support) stressful events across the shift. Results: During the previous month and year, officers working the afternoon and night shifts reported more stressful events than day shift officers for total stress, administrative/professional pressure, and physical/psychological danger (p < 0.05). These differences were independent of age, sex, race/ethnicity, and police rank. The frequency of these stressful events did not differ significantly between officers working the afternoon and night shifts. Conclusion: Non-day shift workers may be exposed to more stressful events in this cohort. Interventions to reduce or manage police stress that are tailored by shift may be considered.

• Korean Journal of Occupational Health Nursing
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.44-54
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• 2009

Purpose: The aim of this study was to examine the effects of obesity on the physiological levels of adiponectin, leptin and components of metabolic syndrome (MS) in male workers, aged 30-40 years. Methods: Body mass index (BMI) was measured with Anthropometric equipment. Blood pressure and serum parameters were measured with an automatic digital sphygmomanometer and autochemical analyzer, respectively. Adiponectin and leptin were analysed by ELISA kits and MS was defined based on the NCEP-ATP III. Results: Body fat mass of waist and hip, systolic and diastolic blood pressure were significantly higher, as expected, in the BMI>25kg/$m^2$ in comparison with the $BMI{\leq}25kg/m^2$. While fasting glucose, insulin, HOMA-IR and leptin in the BMI>25kg/$m^2$ were also significantly higher compared with $BMI{\leq}25kg/m^2$, HDL-cholesterol and adiponectin were significantly higher in $BMI{\leq}25kg/m^2$. On multiple logistic regression analysis for the components of MS, exercise, adiponectin and leptin were an only independent factor for MS in non-obese male workers($BMI{\leq}25kg/m^2$) after adjustment for age, cigarette smoking and drinking habits. Conclusion: These results suggested that the obesity in men was associated with physiological levels of adiponectin and leptin contributing to feedback control of MS and that dysfunction and/or declination in feedback control system associated with changes in physiological levels of neurptrophics: adiponectin and leptin might ultimately induce MS.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.156-156
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• 2015

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.37 no.6
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• pp.32-39
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• 2022

This study analyzed the relationship between occupational accidents in the construction industry and business cycle factors. Multiple regression analyses were conducted to achieve the research purpose; additionally, time-varying parameter estimations were performed to interpret the results. The results obtained for the construction industry revealed a statistically significant relationship between occupational accidents and wage increase rate, unemployment, construction starts, and other factors. The wage increase rate plays a role in reducing occupational accidents because efforts are made to prevent accidents owing to the increase in income loss due to accidents and the demand for increased safety levels. The number of construction starts affects occupational accidents with a time lag of 1 to 2 or 4 months; therefore, it is likely to be used as a leading indicator for estimating fatal accidents in the construction industry. This study highlighted the importance of monitoring socioeconomic changes that could affect the working conditions of workers and workplaces, and production activities in the workplace for the effective prevention of occupational accidents. This study also reveals the necessity of developing a method to operate prevention projects flexibly and the seasonality of industrial characteristics, particularly those of the construction industry where the highest number of fatal occupational injuries occur.

• Korean Journal of Occupational Health Nursing
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.239-249
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• 2008

Purpose: This study intended to investigate how health and safety organization, management, activities and safety culture of healthcare industries are different from other industries (food, lodging, gas, and electricity industries). Method: Data were analyzed using '2005 The National Survey for Occupational Safety and Health Tendency'. Results: For health and safety training, both new training and regular training time of healthcare sector was lower than comparison sectors. For health and safety manager assigning form, there were many case in healthcare sector to assign a safety manager as a deputy and a health manager as an additional job, there were some differences from comparison sectors. It was found that establishment of countermeasures by cause investigation and analysis execution for occupational accidents in the healthcare sector was lower than comparison sectors. For health and safety activities and safety culture awareness, they were estimated in healthcare sector to be lower than comparison sectors. Conclusion: Healthcare sector had relatively lower health and safety activities and safety culture awareness compared with comparison sectors. So, it is required business owner's concerns and efforts to assign exclusively responsible health and safety manager and to activate health and safety training and occupational accident prevention.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.125-132
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• 2018

Background: According to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) accounted for 32% of all nonfatal injury and illness cases in 2014 among full-time workers. Our objective was to review and summarize the evidence linking occupational exposures to vibration and awkward posture with MSDs of the shoulder and neck. Methods: A literature search was conducted using the terms musculoskeletal disorders, vibration, and awkward posture. All types of observational epidemiologic studies, with the exception of case reports, published during 1998-2015 were included. Databases searched were MEDLINE (Ovid), Embase (Ovid), Scopus, Ergonomic Abstracts, NIOSHTIC-2, and Health and Safety Science Abstracts. Results: Occupational exposures to whole-body or hand-arm vibration were significantly associated with or resulted in MSDs of the shoulder and neck. Awkward postures while working were also associated with MSDs in these locations. These findings were consistent across study designs, populations, and countries. Conclusion: Occupational exposure to vibration and awkward posture are associated with shoulder and neck MSDs. Longitudinal studies are required to elucidate the mechanisms responsible for these associations, and intervention studies are warranted.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.40-48
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• 2011

This study was intended to resolve problems caused by different classification criteria and management methods of carcinogenicity, which have made industrial safety & health institutions and business employers difficult to execute projects or to carry out occupational safety and health related works, and have affected how civic groups perceive carcinogens. The content of this study contained the comparison of management and categorization standards for carcinogens between Korea and other countries as well as the current carcinogenicity-related information supply status of each professional institution. Furthermore, this research examined the current state of supplying information on carcinogenicity among major institutional information supply according to the categorization standard for carcinogens by UN GHS, Ministry of Employment and Labor in Korea(KMoEL), and GHS MSDS provided by Korea Occupational Safety & Health Agency(KOSHA). Now, professional agency provide 927 kinds of IARC, 237 kinds of NTP, 351 kinds of ACGIH and 1,006 kinds of EU ECHA information on carcinogenic agents. KMoEL provides carcinogenicity-related information of 58 chemical agents in accordance with the category of carcinogens guided by ACGIH. KOSHA offers 13,232 kinds of GHS MSDS information including 2,484 carcinogenic substances. Therefore, carcinogenicity-related information of chemical substances, which are not available on the existing GHS MSDS DB, should be updated for the future reference.

• International Journal of Safety
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.10-15
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• 2011

In Japan, protective measures to reduce falls from scaffolds have been strictly applied within industry safety guidelines, and such measures have significantly decreased fatal accidents due to falls from scaffolds. However, the rate of fatal accidents from falls is still high in the construction industries. In order to examine further countermeasures to reduce such falls, the Japan Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare established a committee in our institute. That committee$\acute{i}$s work experimentally confirmed the effectiveness of using plastic sheets as a covering around scaffolds to protect against falls of construction materials (a method widely used in Japan). However, the workers fell from the space between the work platform and the plastic sheets very occasionally. Based on those results, the plastic sheets were improved for fall protection from the space, and the effect of the improved sheets was confirmed experimentally.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.261-262
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• 2022

Globally, it is estimated that the number of people living outside of their country of origin reached 281 million in 2020. The primary drive of those migrants when migrating voluntarily is work to increase their income and provide for their families left behind in their home countries. Those who migrate immediately seek means of income to sustain themselves through a perilous process as currently evidenced in the war in Ukraine and not too long ago in Syria and Venezuela. Unfortunately, migrant workers are globally known to predominantly be working in "4-D jobs"- dirty, dangerous, and difficult and discriminatory; the fourth D was recently added to acknowledge the discriminatory aspect and other social determinants of health migrant workers face in their host country while exposed to precarious work. Consequently, migrant workers are at considerable risk of work-related illnesses and injury but their health needs are critically overlooked in research and policy. Recognizing the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights "Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment", we cannot consider any human life - thus, the life of migrant workers - as dispensable through a structural discriminatory process that undervalues their occupational safety and health, livelihood and the contribution these workers bring to their host countries. This was seen during the preparation for the upcoming world cup in Qatar where migrant workers were exposed to a multiplicity of serious hazards including deadly heat hazards.