Safety perception events

On the use of metrics for indicating safety, likelihood and consequence have a principal role and they form the two basic dimensions. When indicating risks, from historical facts and figures, simulations and knowledge, the likelihood and consequences can be established. The actual likelihood and consequence can never be derived exactly and they will always be based on perceptions of risks as discussed in Chapter 1. This perception of risks will in this Chapter be referred to as the perceived risks , which is the defined as the (perceived) likelihood and the perceived consequences of an event. The Sis attempt to indicate this perceived safety related risk in terms of the perceived likelihood and the perceived safety-related consequence of an event. For reasons of clarity the term risk will refer to the perceived safety related risk and consequences will refer to the perceived safety related consequences in the remainder of this Chapter. The consequences are always based on people s perception of how great the damage to people, environment, or assets might be. The likelihood of an event will sometimes be estimated (perceived). 

Risk managers must be aware that in the event of a crisis consumers perceptions about risks can have as great or greater impact on the outcome than the real food safety issues. 

The objective of performing a HAZOP or What-If review is to identify and develop credible process upset scenarios or causes which could adversely impact safety, health, environment, quality, productivity or public perception of the company. Obviously a multitude of events both common (line rupture) and very farfetched could be identified (meteor striking facility). The aim is to identify events that have a very real possibility of occurring at the facility. Although all such far fetched events may be listed, it is generally not practical or necessary to do so. 

Rescue and safety workers have also been studied. Nishiwaki et al. (2001) studied 27 male rescue team staff and 30 police officers, 3-45 months after the event. The study subjects showed decreased performance on the digit span test however, no effects on stabilometry and vibration perception threshold were found. Li et al. (2004) followed 27 male firefighters and 25 male police officers three years after the attack for genotoxic effects. They found an elevated frequency of sister chromatid exchanges in lymphocytes of the victims which were related to the percentage of ChE inhibition observed just after the attack. 

The method of patient recruiting, consenting, and blinding has been shown to influence patient beliefs and subsequent reporting of efficacy and safety of the medication. Means and type of vehicle delivery appear to affect patient perception of intervention strength, and adverse events.One study found that increased confidence in the manufacturer appeared to supplement relief obtained in both placebo and active medication groups. 

When operating at elevated levels of risk, the only question is which of many potential events will trigger the loss. Before the Columbia accident, NASA manned space operations was experiencing a slew of problems in the orbiters. Ihe head of the NASA Manned Space Program at the time misinterpreted the fact that they were finding and fixing problems and wrote a report that concluded risk had been reduced by more than a factor of five [74]. The same unrealistic perception of risk led to another report in 1995 recommending that NASA restructure and reduce overall safety, reliability, and quality assurance elements [105]. 

The general public s traditional perception of textile factories is that the social standards within these facilities are poor. Events over the past few years with the tragic loss of life due to factory fires or building collapses have reinforced this perception. Beyond the terrible fatalities that have occurred, other social problans associated with the apparel industry include child labor, gender inequality, poor health and safety, exposure to harmful chemical and bonded labor. 

Frequency of events reported Perceptions of management Overall emphasis on safety Perceived state of safety... 

Notes Safety Culture Dimension 1 Hospital management support for patient safety 2 Supervisor/manager expectations/actions 3 Teamwork across hospital units 4 Teamwork within units 5 Communication openness 6 Hospital handoffs and transitions 7 Nonpunitive response to error 8 Feedback and communication about error 9 Staffing 10 Organizational learning Outcome dimensions 11 Overall perceptions of safety 12 Frequency of event reporting. 

One way to measure the impact of the PSQA and the PSO contribution to patient safety is to examine the effects of protected reporting on staff perceptions of error. If levels of event reporting improve within an organisation, the responses... 

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