• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.26 no.1
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• pp.90-98
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• 2016

Objectives: The aim of this study is to analyze the status of implementation of occupational safety and health education and evaluate the relation between the implementation of education and occupational accidents. Methods: This study used data on occupational safety and health education from the 2012 Current Status of Occupational Safety and Health survey by the Korea Occupational Safety and Health Agency. The sample is 7,010 persons working in relation to occupational safety and health in industry. An ANOVA test is used to analyze the status of and need for education. Poisson regression is used to evaluate the relation between education and occupational accidents. Results: The rate of implementation of education is 53.3% for periodic education on workers holding office positions, 68.3% for periodic education for workers not holding office positions, 60.3% for periodic education for persons holding managerial and supervisory positions, 65.5% for education provided upon hiring, 50.5% for education provided upon changes in work activities and 37.2% for special education. In the Poisson regression, these data strongly suggest that the probability of occupational accidents occurring with education implemented is much lower than without the implementation of any kind of safety and health education. Conclusions: It is clear that implementation of education has a positive effect on reducing occupational accidents, although its application in domestic industry is insufficient. Thus, it is concluded that education on occupational safety and health should be strengthened for the prevention of occupational accidents.

• Journal of the Ergonomics Society of Korea
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• v.34 no.4
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• pp.353-362
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• 2015

Objective: This study aims to analyze occupational accidents of moving helpers by work place type which means the type of residence where moving operation is done. Background: Most efforts have been focused on the industry base comprising various occupational spectrum and provided industry general preventative policies. But occupation specific policies are required for the workers involved and will reduce the occurrences of occupational accidents for the workers subject to similar working environment and process. Method: This study analyzes 208 non-motor vehicle collision related occupational accidents of moving helpers working for used household and office goods moving industry occurring from 2010 to 2012. Accident Type, agencies, event or exposure, parts of body affected are characterized by work places according to the work environment. Results: Accidents characteristics showed the difference between high-rise type and low-rise type on the size of enterprise, age, gender and work experience of the injured. Also the accident type, source of accident and parts of body affected are different between the two work place types. Finally, Accidents occurred on the specific operational processes of moving service also showed different characteristic between the two types. Conclusion and Application: The findings of accident characteristics according to workplace types and operational process of moving service can be used as baseline data for establishing systemized preventative policies for occupational accidents of moving helpers.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.505-510
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• 2021

Background: Factors related to root causes can cause commonly occurring accidents such as falls, slips, and jammed injuries. An important means of reducing the frequency of occupational accidents in small- to medium-sized enterprises (SMSEs) of South Korea is to perform intensity analysis of the root cause factors for accident prevention in the cause and effect model like decision models, epidemiological models, system models, human factors models, LCU (life change unit) models, and the domino theory. Especially intensity analysis in a robot system and smart technology as Industry 4.0 is very important in order to minimize the occupational accidents and fatal accident because of the complexity of accident factors. Methods: We have developed the modern cause and effect model that includes factors of root cause through statistical testing to minimize commonly occurring accidents and fatal accidents in SMSEs of South Korea and systematically proposed educational policies for accident prevention. Results: As a result, the consciousness factors among factors of root cause such as unconsciousness, disregard, ignorance, recklessness, and misjudgment had strong relationships with occupational accidents in South Korean SMSEs. Conclusion: We conclude that the educational policies necessary for minimizing these consciousness factors include continuous training procedures followed by periodic hands-on experience, along with perceptual and cognitive education related to occupational health and safety.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.213-217
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• 2016

Background: The objective of this study is to identify high-risk groups for industrial accidents by setting up 2003 as the base year and conducting an in-depth analysis of the trends of major industrial accident indexes the index of industrial accident rate, the index of occupational injury rate, the index of occupational illness and disease rate per 10,000 people, and the index of occupational injury fatality rate per 10,000 people for the past 10 years. Methods: This study selected industrial accident victims, who died or received more than 4 days of medical care benefits, due to occupational accidents and diseases occurring at workplaces, subject to the Industrial Accident Compensation Insurance Act, as the study population. Results: According to the trends of four major indexes by workplace characteristics, the whole industry has shown a decreasing tendency in all four major indexes since the base year (2003); as of 2012, the index of industrial accident rate was 67, while the index of occupational injury fatality rate per 10,000 people was 59. Conclusion: The manufacturing industry, age over 50 years and workplaces with more than 50 employees showed a high severity level of occupational accidents. Male workers showed a higher severity level of occupational accidents than female workers. The employment period of < 3 years and newly hired workers with a relatively shorter working period are likely to have more occupational accidents than others. Overall, an industrial accident prevention policy must be established by concentrating all available resources and capacities of these high-risk groups.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.168-176
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• 1996

Statistical analysis of occupational accidents plays an important role in establishing measures against accidents and for evaluating safety performance in work places. This research work, numerous numbers of research work have been conducted, which attemped to verify the existence of !he concept of "accident proneness" Also researches have been developed in the fields of systems safety analysis and risk analysis to analyze the characteristics of occupational accidents. This paper presents a brief historical review of these research activities with particular emphasis on the statistical analysis of occupational accidents. Based on this review, further development needs in relation to the statistical research on the occupational accidents in the near future are discussed.discussed.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.39-46
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• 2022

This study has found the socio-economic factors that affect occupational accidents and measured the influence quantitatively. We built the panel data of 4 countries (Japan, Germany, the U.S., and the U.K.) and the analysis model counted on the fixed effect model to reflect the countries' differences. The fatal occupational injury rates in the analyzed countries had a statistically significant relationship with the level of per capita GDP, the proportion of the construction industry, the rate of male workers, annual average working hours, the rate of workers in manufacturing and construction industries, etc. The annual average working hours have a positive correlation with the fatal occupational injury rate. To reduce occupational accidents effectively, we should be monitoring and researching various factors that can affect the occurrence of occupational accidents such as worker characteristics, changing industrial structure, and changes in working hours.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.693-710
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• 2022

Social interest in occupational safety and health is increasing due to ESG management and the implementation of the Serious Accidents Punishment Act. This study examines the current status of occupational accidents, which is the safety level of energy companies, and the impact of occupational accidents on the management performance (sales per capita, operating profit per capita, operating margin per capita) of energy companies over the period of 2015 to 2021 was empirically analyzed. As a result of the analysis, the level of occupational accidents in the 157 energy companies to be analyzed was lower than the occupational injury accident rate in Korea, but the disease rate was high.As a result of analyzing the impact of occupational accidents on management performance, it is estimated that an increase in the occupational accident rate reduces per capita sales, per capita operating profit, and gross margin rate.Through this study, the vulnerability of energy companies to occupational accidents was confirmed, and the direct and indirect costs of occupational accidents quantified the negative impact on management performance.Referring to the results of this study, energy companies should strengthen their efforts to prevent occupational accidents by increasing investment in safety and health to protect the lives of valuable workers and create sustainable business performance.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.148-157
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• 2011

Objectives: Although compensation for occupational injuries and diseases is guaranteed in almost all nations, countries vary greatly with respect to how they organize workers' compensation systems. In this paper, we focus on three aspects of workers' compensation insurance in Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries - types of systems, employers' funding mechanisms, and coverage for injured workers - and their impacts on the actual frequencies of occupational injuries and diseases. Methods: We estimated a panel data fixed effect model with cross-country OECD and International Labor Organization data. We controlled for country fixed effects, relevant aggregate variables, and dummy variables representing the occupational accidents data source. Results: First, the use of a private insurance system is found to lower the occupational accidents. Second, the use of risk-based pricing for the payment of employer raises the occupational injuries and diseases. Finally, the wider the coverage of injured workers is, the less frequent the workplace accidents are. Conclusion: Private insurance system, fixed flat rate employers' funding mechanism, and higher coverage of compensation scheme are significantly and positively correlated with lower level of occupational accidents compared with the public insurance system, risk-based funding system, and lower coverage of compensation scheme.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.11-19
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• 2013

Backgrounds: Occupations are grouped on the basis of similarity in tasks and duties performed. Standard occupational classification (SOC) is a tool for organizing all professions into a clearly defined set of groups according to the tasks and duties undertaken in the respective jobs. Objectives: The major objective of this study is to comprehensively review how a SOC system is used in occupational and safety fields such as surveillance, exposure monitoring, occupational epidemiological study, management of carcinogens and analysis of occupational accidents. Methods: We summarized the cases, policies and regulations used in SOC systems in advanced countries and as they appear in articles Results: We found that SOC systems have been widely used in various areas of occupational safety and health in the US, the UK, Finland, and the EU. In general, it is highly common to use SOC in the analysis of occupational accidents and diseases and to identify factors causing those accidents. The SOC system is also used not only for surveillance of exposure to hazardous agents and occupational health, but to manage carcinogens. In order to adjust the effects of a particular job, SOC is used in the general population health area. The Ministry of Employment and Labor (MOEL) has never used or introduced an SOC system. There have been no cases of the application of a SOC system to either the occupational safety and health field or to health surveillance for the general population in Korea. Conclusions: We suggested a need to introduce an SOC system in several occupational safety and health activities, such as work environment measurement, analysis of occupational accidents, specific physical examination and surveillance systems, etc.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.4 no.3
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• pp.160-165
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• 2013

Background: Occupational accidents are unplanned events that cause damage. The socio-economic impacts and human costs of accidents are tremendous around the world. Many fatalities happen every year in workplaces such as electricity distribution companies. Some electrical injuries are electrocution, electric shock, and burns. This study was conducted in an electricity distribution company (with rotational 12-hour shift work) in Iran during an 8-year period to survey descriptive factors of injuries. Methods: Variables collected included accident time, age of injured worker, employment type, work experience, injury cause, educational background, and other information about accidents. Results: Results indicated that most of the accidents occurred in summer, and 51.3% were during shift work. Worker negligence (malpractice) was the cause of 75% of deaths. Type of employment had a significant relationship with type of injuries (p < 0.05). Most injuries were electrical burns. Conclusion: High rate of accidents in summer may be due to the warm weather or insufficient professional skills in seasonal workers. Shift workers are at risk of sleep complaints leading to a high rate of work injuries. Acquiring knowledge about safety was related to job experiences. Temporary workers have no chance to work all year like permanent workers, therefore impressive experiences may be less in them. Because the lack of protective equipment and negligence are main causes of accidents, periodical inspections in workshops are necessary.