• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.4 no.2
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• pp.87-94
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• 2013

Background: In times of continuous change and volatile markets, organizations are increasingly characterized by downsizing, work intensification, and resource rationalization. This has resulted in diversification, and the emergence of newrisks within the field of occupational health and safety, with an important impact. This paper focuses on one such type of risk in the modern workplace-psychosocial risks. The current study aimed to explore stakeholder perspectives, regarding the extent to which psychosocial risks are incorporated into strategic risk management practices, at both the business and policy level. Methods: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 14 professionals, representing employer, expert, policy maker, and trade union stakeholder perspectives. Results: It was found that the majority of organizations do not sufficiently, if at all, understand and incorporate psychosocial risks into strategic decision making, whereby the key barrier related to practical difficulties of not knowing how to manage psychosocial risks adequately. Conclusion: The study found that there is a need to close the gap between policy and practice on a number of levels. Future recommendations comprise a policy framework and infrastructure underpinned by educational initiatives, partnerships, and networks to drive a shift in attitudes toward recognizing the duality of the concept of risk (including both potential negative and positive outcomes) and moving beyond simple regulatory compliance.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.35-44
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• 2014

This study empirically examines how much effect levels of fatigue and stress of a construction worker have on disaster risks from the perspective of human factors concerning construction disaster risks. To achieve the purpose of this study, a survey was conducted with respect to construction workers working at large construction sites within the metropolitan area. The retrieved survey data were analyzed by using the statistical software programs, SPSS 18.0 and AMOS 8.0. The results of this study do not definitively lead to the conclusion that the level of fatigue or stress of construction workers result in disaster risks. However, it does show that the results vary depending upon the individual approach and treatment of stress and fatigue. In particular, this study revealed that disaster risk levels could increase through unsafe behavior intentions which were established as a mediator variable. Also, with respect to unsafe behavior intentions of construction workers leading to disaster risks, when examining the results that the level of mental fatigue, occupational stress and social-psychological stress of construction workers had a greater significant effect than the level of physical fatigue, this study demonstrates the importance of psychological and mental issues that could be easily overlooked with respect manual labor workers.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.429-439
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• 2022

Background: The risk observatory (RO) of the German Social Accident Insurance (DGUV) provides strategic support to the German Social Accident Insurance Institutions (GSAII) in proactive prevention. It does so by identifying future challenges and opportunities for occupational safety and health (OSH) resulting from new trends and developments that affect employees as well as children in elementary education, pupils, and students. Methods: The core of the RO is an online survey that relies on a pool of new trends and developments identified via internet and literature research. 865 prevention experts of the GSAII and the DGUV participated in the survey. They rated trends and developments regarding their sector-specific risks and opportunities for OSH in the 5 years to come. Results: Sector-specific and over-all results show that besides well-known OSH risks such as musculoskeletal stress and noise, developments relevant for OSH come to the fore that do not have their origin in work itself, but are strongly influenced by political, social, economic, environmental, or technical developments that accident insurance can only peripherally influence. Shortage of skilled staff was identified as a threat to OSH in almost all sectors. Conclusions: Prevention must find ways to address repercussions of such OSH risks. Cooperation and political awareness are therefore gaining in importance. Also, implementing a prevention culture in society and strengthening individuals' health and safety literacy, e.g., by target-group-specific communication and sensitization, as well as early safety and health education, help to counteract those OSH risks.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.105-121
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• 2011

Objectives: This paper presents the framework and protocol design for a construction industry risk management toolbox. The construction industry needs a comprehensive, systematic approach to assess and control occupational risks. These risks span several professional health and safety disciplines, emphasized by multiple international occupational research agenda projects including: falls, electrocution, noise, silica, welding fumes, and musculoskeletal disorders. Yet, the International Social Security Association says, "whereas progress has been made in safety and health, the construction industry is still a high risk sector." Methods: Small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) employ about 80% of the world's construction workers. In recent years a strategy for qualitative occupational risk management, known as Control Banding (CB) has gained international attention as a simplified approach for reducing work-related risks. CB groups hazards into stratified risk 'bands', identifying commensurate controls to reduce the level of risk and promote worker health and safety. We review these qualitative solutions-based approaches and identify strengths and weaknesses toward designing a simplified CB 'toolbox' approach for use by SMEs in construction trades. Results: This toolbox design proposal includes international input on multidisciplinary approaches for performing a qualitative risk assessment determining a risk 'band' for a given project. Risk bands are used to identify the appropriate level of training to oversee construction work, leading to commensurate and appropriate control methods to perform the work safely. Conclusion: The Construction Toolbox presents a review-generated format to harness multiple solutions-based national programs and publications for controlling construction-related risks with simplified approaches across the occupational safety, health and hygiene professions.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.1-9
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• 2023

Background: Firefighting involves exposure of firefighters to risks related to this activity, serious injuries, and occupational diseases are recorded. There are other consequences such as thermal and emotional stress. This systematic review is proposed in order to analyze the risks and consequences faced by these workers and thus provide elements to improve safety management systems in institutions. Method: A descriptive observational study of systematic literature review on the risks and consequences of exposure to firefighters' activity was proposed, and the information was analyzed and described based on the available data and according to the variables determined. Results: The studies showed data on mechanical, physical, chemical, psychosocial risks, workers' perception and resilience, and epidemiological data. Information related to firefighters' activity on falls and slips, exposure to noise, and high concentrations of carbon monoxide is detailed. In addition, the relationship between burnout, cognitive, and physical fatigue as adverse effects on health and performance is mentioned. Conclusions: Among the preventive measures, the use of personal protective equipment is suggested, incorporation in prevention programs of information on exposure to risk factors, as well as the implementation of models that can predict the perception of workers, additionally, the generation of management systems with safety climate models for fire departments.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
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• 2022.06a
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• pp.579-586
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• 2022

Modular building is a fast-growing construction method, mainly due to its ability to drastically reduce the amount of time it takes to construct a building and produce higher-quality buildings at a more consistent rate. However, while modular construction is relatively safer than traditional construction methods, workers are still exposed to hazards that lead to injuries and fatalities, and these hazards could be controlled using emerging smart technologies. Currently, limited information is available at the intersection of modular construction, safety risk, and smart safety technologies. This paper aims to investigate what aspects of modular construction are most dangerous for its workers, highlight specific risks in its processes, and propose ways to utilize smart technologies to mitigate these safety risks. Findings from the archival analysis of accident reports in Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) Fatality and Catastrophe Investigation Summaries indicate that 114 significant injuries were reported between 2002 and 2021, of which 67 were fatalities. About 72% of fatalities occurred during the installation phase, while 57% were caused by crushing and 85% of crash-related incidents were caused by jack failure/slippage. IoT-enabled wearable sensing devices, computer vision, smart safety harness, and Augment and Virtual Reality were identified as potential solutions for mitigating identified safety risks. The present study contributes to knowledge by identifying important safety trends, critical safety risk factors and proposing practical emerging methods for controlling these risks.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.80-85
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• 2014

A survey of risk perception in South Korea was conducted in 2007 to evaluate relative riskiness of typical industrial and technological risks. This article summarizes the characteristics of risk perception using psychometric analyses. The survey with a sample size of 1,194 reviews the perceived level of 25 risk items in the areas of transportation, chemicals, environment, industry, nuclear power generation, and newly-introduced risks. Six categories of risk identified by a factor analysis show that the level of perceived risk does not correspond to the statistical level. Psychometric analyses including voluntariness, severity, effect manifestation, exposure pattern, controllability, familiarity, benefit and necessity demonstrate that voluntary, familiar and immediate risks are perceived as less risky than involuntary, unfamiliar and delayed ones. Risk communication is critical in reducing the discrepance between objective and subjective level of risk. However, the amount of risk information does not always justify a successful risk communication. A safety policy, risk communication strategy in particular, should take into account diverse dimensions of risk reviewed by psychometric analyses in the study. Social policy toward safety can be improved by integrating policy, human, and social factors as well as technological advances.

• Korean Journal of Occupational Health Nursing
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.363-371
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• 2020

Purpose: This study aimed to evaluate the effect of information regarding health and safety risks on the subjective health status of workers using data from the Fifth Korean Working Conditions Survey. Methods: Among the survey respondents, 30,094 people classified as salaried workers, of which 8,513 (28.3%) used protective equipment. Results: Although the majority of workers using protective equipment reported being well-informed about safety and health risks, 15% of them were still insufficiently informed. Multivariate analyses have shown that the subjective health status of workers using protective equipment was significantly better if they received sufficient information. When the workers using protective equipment were classified by the kinds of hazards they were exposed to, the satisfaction of information was also significantly beneficial for the subjective health status of all groups. However, in workers who did not use protective equipment, information satisfaction did not appear to be a significant factor. Conclusion: These results suggest that when providing information on safety and health risks, it is necessary to focus on workers using protective equipment, for whom the effects of the policy are clearly expected.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.20-24
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• 2012

Experimental studies were performed to investigate the eye injury risks by different BB pellet materials. Four different BB pellet materials were used: plastic (P), silicon (S), rubber (R) and plastic covered with silicon (SR). The BB pellet images penetrating into the gelatine simulant were recorded by a high-speed video camera. The results obtained from the different pellet materials were discussed in terms of impact velocity and penetration depth; threshold velocity and projectile sectional density; eye injury risks by normalized energies. It was found that the P pellets caused higher impact velocity while the lower was SR pellets. The penetration depth and threshold velocity of the pellets were dependent on the impact velocity of the pellets, and the P pellets resulted in the higher eye injury risk while the lower was SP.

• Journal of Applied Reliability
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.73-91
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• 2010

All activities relate to railway traffic involve risk and that these arise from a combination of the nature of operating activities. Proper management system is required to provide the organizational capability to reveal, analyse and address these weaknesses over time and in reasonably practicable ways, which will determine the rate at which risks can be further reduced. This paper presents a systematic risk analysis approach to safety planning and decision making, informed by a range of risk assessment techniques. An railway organization's safety management system is also presented that shows the approaches taken to minimize the external risks, and identify the shared risks and explain how they will be controlled through collaboration with others.