Measuring safety improvements

I suggested instead that they begin to measure something positive and proactive that might drive safety awareness. Within a short time, all of the teams began to measure safety improvements. Each team would target a number of improvements for the quarter. Then, in their quarterly review... 

A number of risk importance measures have been defined for the interpretation of PSAs and for use in prioritization of operational and safety improvements. Some of these measures are similar to sensitivity defined as the total derivative (equation 2.8-1). 

Measurement of performance. Quality Management requires that measures of performance be established for every activity. These measures include end-of-pipe measurement, such as amounts of material released into the environment or injury rates, and in-process measures of how efficiently you are managing, such as time to review safety improvement proposals or total resources expended on PSM. Each team should be required to identify potential performance measures for the processes they are developing and the activities these processes manage. Many of the end-of-pipe measures will already exist these should be critically examined to ensure that they truly measure performance and are not unduly influenced by other factors. For example, the number of accidents in a fleet of road vehicles is almost directly dependent on the number of miles driven with no improvement in performance, a reduction in miles driven would reduce the number of accidents. 

Deciding which risk-reduction method to use maybe difficult. In many instances, appropriate decisions can be made without resorting to quantitative techniques. However, in some cases, particularly when the options are costly, quantitative risk analysis (QRA) and risk-based decision-making approaches may be an effective basis for measuring the improvement in safety arising from the proposed options. These approaches can also be used in prioritizing safety improvements and balancing cost and production issues. 

ADEs and medication errors can be extracted from practice data, incidents reports from health professionals, and patient surveys. Practice data include charts, laboratory, prescription data, and administrative databases, and can be reviewed manually or screened by computer systems to identify signals. A method of ADE and medication error detection and classification has been presented that is feasible and has good reliability (Marimoto et al. 2004). It can be used in various clinical settings to measure and improve medication safety. 

The Dow Fire and Explosion Index (FEI) (12) and the Dow Chemical Exposure Index (CEI) (14) are two commonly used tools that measure inherent safety characteristics. Gowland (25) reports on the use of the FEI and CEI in the development of safety improvements for a urethane plant. Tables 1 and 2 illustrate the application of the FEI and CEI in measuring inherent safety characteristics of process design options. These indices measure the inherent safety characteristics of processes in only two specific areas—fire and explosion hazards and acute chemical inhalation toxicity hazards. Other indices would be required to evaluate other types of hazards. 

On an offshore platform, however, the persons who are not on duty are still present, and they may be killed or injured. Many of the deaths on the Piper Alpha platform, for example, were of off-duty crew who were sleeping, and who could not escape from the Living Quarters. By contrast, 25 years later, when the explosion and fire occurred on the Deepwater Horizon platform, 11 men died instantly, but the other 135 persons on board survived the blast and subsequent fire. This is an indication that the safety measures that have been designed into platforms in the years following Piper have had a positive effect on safety improvement. 

The work of the Nuclear-Safety Service according to the plan and measures to improve the state of nuclear safety, and holding of regular meetings ... 

The head of the Labor-Protection and Safety Service is the manager of the Radiation-Safety Service. The Radiation-Safety Service works according to the plan and measures for improving radiation safety at the plant. 

Measuring Safety Performance to Achieve Long-Term Improvement by James C. Manzella, September 1999. 

Manzella, James C. Measuring Safety Performance To Achieve Long-Term Improvement. Professional Safety, September 1999. 

Because there are penalties for noncompliance, companies do keep their OSHA-required metrics current, but many stop there. In Chapter 11 on metrics, I will explain how using metrics that are related to innovative safety awareness programs can measure as well as promote ongoing safety improvement. 

In the previous stage of the reconstruction programme for Units 1 to 4, several technical measures to improve nuclear safety during low power and shutdown conditions were implemented for example, installation of a cold overpressurization device in all units, development of a feed and bleed procedure, and installation of complementary emergency feedwater system located outside the turbine hall were completed. 

Within the safety improvement programme of Mochovce NPP (under construction), several safety improvements were analysed in more detail and corresponding measures were taken as follows ... 

Every month, SMS measures the previous 24 months of roadside violation and crash data performance and calculates a score in the seven Behavior Analysis and Safety Improvement Categories (BASICS). 

Behavior Analysis and Safety Improvement Categories (BASICs) Seven categories of safety behaviors measured in the Compliance, Safety, Accountability (CSA) Safety Measurement System (SMS). The BASICs represent behaviors that can lead to crashes. The BASICs are unsafe driving, hours-of-service compliance, driver fitness, controlled substances/alcohol, vehicle maintenance, hazardous materials (HM) compliance, and crash indicator. 

Issues of case mix adjustment matter much less however, if a unit or institution simply wishes to track its own progress over time and use the mortality or morbidity data as a stimulus and measure of improvement. If one makes the reasonable assumption that the patient population is relatively stable over time, then an organization can certainly use mortality or morbidity data as an indicator (Bottle and Aylin, 2008). Any change does reflect, albeit imperfectly, a corresponding change in safety and quality, though it may be difficult to identify which improvements were critical to the overall success. 

Furthermore, because of the shifting and changing nature of systems, safety measures themselves affect the system in unanticipated ways. When radar was introduced to improve safety at sea, captains of ships (and their owners) were more able to anticipate bad weather. They were therefore more able to travel in bad weather, could travel more efficiently and thus increase the number of journeys made. A measure to improve safety therefore simultaneously increased danger by exposing ships to worse weather. In a similar vein. Morel, Amalberti and Chauvin (2008) have recently studied deep-sea fishing, an... 

According to a number of experts, in particular from the former USSR, the attitude of the industry towards safety also changed in Eastern Europe after the TMI accident already in early 1980s, Russian designers of VVER reactors proposed a number of measures for safety improvements. 

After the earthquake in Vrancha in 1987, reassessment of the seismic impact was done, and number of measures for improvement the seismic stability of civil constructions and equipment was performed. After the year 1989, IAEA Project (BUL/9/012) was initiated. Within this project additional investigations of the seismic impact on the site were executed, considering also the effect of the local earthquakes. New seismic characteristics of the site were defined SL — 1 = 0.1 g (10 y ) and SL — 2 = 0.2 g (lO " y ). Using the new characteristics, new response spectra were developed (defined) and behaviour of all the components, important to safety, was analyzed under this impact. 

Since the middle of 80-s USSR started work on improvement of all the NPP under operation safety. The Integral Measures to Improve Safety of Power Units under Operation (SM-88, SM-90) were developed based upon analysis of units assembling, start up and operation. 

Under development of the Program on Safety Improvement of NPP with Rector Facilities WWER-1000, WWER-440 as the methodological basis the IAEA classification was adopted as to extent of impact from considered deviations from upon the in-depth-protection (lAEA-EBP-WWER-05). Subdivision of deviations into four categories according to their safety-significance allowed to identify the main directions of work and list of the immediate measures of significant impact upon safety which could be undertaken in the visible terms, namely, by 1998. 

Workers have realized that if the OHS personnel alone are actively implementing the measures of safety improvement, there will be no good results. The spread of information in the organization and the positive attitude for safety among workers is extremely important. 

Considering the NORSOK Standard Z-013 model for risk estimation, analysis and evaluation this proposed framework can be used as a framework to deal further risk reducing measures after achieving the acceptable risk levels and there still safety improvements that can be implemented. And also held decisions about which risk reduction measures should be implemented, the priority of each action, the risk involved in different parts of the process. 

The RNNP project was initiated under the direction of the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate (PD) in 2000. Since 2004 the project has continued under the Petroleum Safety Authority (PSA), the aim being to measure and improve health, safety and environmental conditions in the petroleum activities offshore and at the petroleum facilities on land. 

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