Incident analysis injury information

Near misses are unplanned events (also sometimes called close calls or near hits ), which did not have severe adverse impacts on health or the environment, but just narrowly missed causing severe injury or damage. Often, these near miss incidents are very scary when reviewed in retrospect but we can learn much from them. Recognizing near misses is important because they could be precursors to future serious incidents. Using the information from an analysis of the near miss can help develop lessons learned, a term that describes how we can derive actions to prevent future incidents. 

BLS began collecting additional information on the major injuries in the form of worker and incident characteristics. At that time, BLS also initiated a separate CFOI to review events more effectively than had been possible in the previous survey. The CFOl database can be used to do statistical analysis for fatalities by Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) Codes. The CFOl fatality data is presented in several different categories as shown below ... 

National Safety Council (NSC) For several decades, the National Safety Council (NSC) has compiled data on accidents, incidents, injuries, illnesses, and deaths. An annual publication provided detailed analysis of the data. For many years the publication title was Accident Facts. More recently, the title is Injury Facts. This publication breaks down data and analysis into three groups occupational, motor vehicle, and home and community. Also the publication now reports information on intentional injuries, such as assaults and self-harm. Data come from a variety of sources. 

Summary data on nonfatal injuries and illnesses are released first that identify the number and rate of injuries and illnesses by industry. After more analysis is completed, case and demographic data provide additional details on the worker injured, the nature of the disabling condition, and the event and source producing that condition for those cases that involve one or more days away from work. Fatality data provides information on 28 separate data elements including information on the worker, the fatal incident, and the machinery or equipment involved. 

The Bureau of Labor Statistics Handbook of Methods provides detailed information on the various statistical and sampling procedures the Bureau of Labor Statistics uses to summarize the incidence of occupational injuries, illnesses, and fatalities in the United States. The Bureau of Labor Statistics has been collecting this type of data since the 1940s. However, it wasn t until the passage of the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 when the Bureau of Labor Statistics was given the responsibility of developing a formal data collection and analysis system (Bureau of Labor Statistics 1997,71). 

The second suggested analysis should take the contractors OSHA incident rates into consideration. OSHA requires employers to report and record accident information on occupational injuries and illnesses on the annual OSHA 300 Log. The employer must... 

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Occupation Injury and Illness Classification Manual provides a much more detailed breakout of the type data that is most useful in analysis of occupational incidents. The four major areas of data that the BLS believes are important to collect during review or investigation of occupational safety and health incidents are Nature, Part of Body Affected, Source, and Event or Exposure. The following provide more detailed information with regard to the content of these data sources ... 

Because of the limitations Heinrich imposes on himself, that all incidents are to be of the same type and occurring to the same person, it is implausible that his database could contain the information necessary for analysis and the conclusions he drew on his ratios. Particularly disconcerting is the need for the database to contain information on more than 4500 no-injury cases (300 -e 330 x 5000). Unless a special... 

Epidemiological analysis is only possible when the same type of information (data dimension) is available for all (or a substantial portion) of the accidents being analysed. Typical data dimensions include location and time of the accident or incident, the part of the body injured in an accident and the nature of the injury. 

An occupational injury is defined as any personal injury sustained by an employee dinring the course of work. All occupational injuries, regardless of their severity, should be reported by an employee to his or her supervisor immediately after the incident. The form used for reporting accidents and injuries should be simple but informative (Figures 1-7 and 1-8). Enough information should be secured from both the injured employee and the supervisor to permit proper analysis of the accident, even at a much later date. 

The process is based on the assnmption that nnsafe actions are a significant cause of accidents. The first step is to identify critical behaviors. These are behaviors that are aitical to safety. Kianse (1997) lists four ways to identify these behaviors (1) behavioral analysis of injury reports, (2) worker interviews, (3) observation of the work process, and (4) review of woik rules, job safety analysis, procedures, and so on. Krause feels that 1 is most important but is not simple. Documenting incident reports is usually not specific to behavior patterns. The analysis usually requires getting additional information from operators familiar with the actual work practices. 

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