Work Injury

According to the NSC, the economic impact of fatal and nonfatal unintentional injuries amounted to 693.5 billion in 2009. This is equivalent to about 2,300 per capita, or about 5,900 per household. These are costs that every individual and household pays whether directly out of pocket, through higher prices for goods and services, or through higher taxes. Approximately 35,000,000 hours are lost in a typical year as a result of accidents. (National Safety Council, Injury and Death Statistics, Injury Facts, 2009) 

This is actual time lost from disabling injuries. Often there is spillover from accidents that occurred in previous years that cause lost time in the current year. As an example, a worker exposed to ammonia fumes that suffered permanent damage to his lungs can recover and return to work, but in the following years he may be more susceptible to pneumonia and be unable to work due to illnesses directly related to the previous injury. 

Deaths on the job have decreased over the years, however, they still occur. In a typical year there are 10,400 work deaths in the United States. The deaths are due to a variety of reasons, such as falls, electrocution, drowning, fires, explosions, poison, etc. Table 3-2 lists accidental work deaths by cause for a typical year. 

Impact accidents involve a worker being struck by or striking against an object. Impact accidents are more frequent during turnarounds when a lot of equipment is being moved, lifted, and transferred around. The next most prominent cause of work injuries is falls. Operators, instrument technicians, and analyzer technicians do a lot of climbing on towers 

In order to develop and maintain an effective safety and health program, it is necessary to know not only the most common causes of death and injury but also the parts of the body most frequently injured. The most frequent injuries to specific parts of the body are listed below in order of most frequent injury to least frequent. 

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Number of days away from work injuries ... 

The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) has established a voluntary consensus standard for recording basic facts relating to the nature and occurrence of work injuries, ANSI Z16.2.( ) This standard has been in use for more than 30 years and provides a consistent baseline for many report formats. The standard focuses on injury to personnel and presents standard classification categories. If alternate codes are used in incident reports, special effort and notation must be made to avoid confusing the reader. 

American National Standards Institute. ANSI Z16.2 Method of Recording Basic Facts Relating to the Nature and Occurrence of Work Injuries. New York. 

Serious Injury—The classification for an occupational injury which includes all disabling work injuries and non-disabling work injuries as follows eye injuries requiring treatment by a physician, fractures, injuries requiring hospitalization, loss of consciousness, injuries requiring treatment by a doctor and injuries requiring restriction of motion or work, or assignment to another job. 

You might be surprised who has the most dangerous jobs. They are not the employees you first think about. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) provides an interesting insight to the safety of workers. The Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries administered by the BLS, in conjunction with participating state agencies, compiles comprehensive and timely information on fatal work injuries occurring in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. 

Data on fatal work injuries are from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries (CFOI), 1995. This program, which has collected occupational fatality data nationwide since 1992, uses diverse data sources to identify, verify, and profile fatal work injuries. Information about each workplace fatality (occupation and other worker characteristics, equipment being used, and circumstances of the event) is obtained by cross-referencing source documents, such as death certificates, workers compensation records, and reports to Federal and State agencies. This method assures counts are as complete and accurate as possible. 

There is more than one method to calculate fatality rates that measure the incidence of fatal work injuries for groups of workers. An hours-based rate measures the risk of fatality per standardized length of exposure an employment-based rate measures the risk for those employed during a given period of time. 

Rate = (Fatal work injuries + Employment x 100,000 workers). Employment is based on 1995 CPS. 

Another method of expressing risk is an index of relative risk. This measure is calculated for a group of workers as the ratio of the rate for that group to the rate for all workers.3 The index of relative risk compares the fatality risk of a group of workers with all workers. For example, the relative risk for truck drivers in Table 1—3 is 5.3, which means that they are roughly five times as likely to have a fatal work injury as the average worker. 

Data on fatal work injuries are from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries (CFOI). 1. This program, which has collected occupational fatality data nationwide since 1992, uses diverse... 

Rale = (Fatal work injuries + Employment x 100,0(X) workers). Employment is based on 199.5 CPS Index of Relative Risk = Fatality rate for a given group -5- Fatality rate for aU workers. 

The National Safety Council of the United States reports volumes of statistics on recordable work injuries and illnesses based on recordkeeping requirements of the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970. The 1995 figures were based on 124 million employees. [37]... 

If the project is completed without any major mishaps, all the above may seem like wasted effort. However, should a contractor submit a claim for liquidated damages or a worker sue for a long-forgotten work injury, proper documentation could save the Owner a lot of aggravation and hundreds of thousands of dollars. 

See Lewin, T. Commission sues railroad to end genetic testing in work injury cases. New York Times, February 10, 2001. 

The OSHA system uses the following formula in determining company annual injury and illness incidence. The total number of recordable injuries is multiplied by 200,000 and then divided by the number of hours worked by the company employees. This gives an injury frequency per 100 person hours of work (injury incidence). These measures can be compared to an industry average. 

American National Standards Institute (ANSI), Specifications for Informationed Signs Complementary to ANSI Z35.1-1972, Accident Prevention Signs, Z35.4-1973, ANSI, New York, 1973. American National Standards Institute (ANSI), Method of Recording and Measuring Work Injury Experience, Z16.1-1973, ANSI, New York, 1973. 

Pseudorandom number generators, 2472—2473 Psychological disorders, 1170 Psychophysics, 1071-1072 Psychosocial stress, 1170 P3P (Platform for Privacy Preferences), 269 PTS, see Predetermined time standards Public health approach to occupational safety and health, 1157-1159 Public information, 232 Public-key cryptosystems, 733-734 Public network-based applications, 243-244 Public utility industries, work injuries in, 1070 Puerto Rico, 957-958, 959 Pull systems (production) ... 

Wokutch, Richard E. and Josetta S. McLaughlin. 1992. The US and Japanese Work Injury and Illness Experience. Monthly Labor Review. April, 115(4) 3-11. 

Root, N., Hoefer, M. (1979). The first work-injury data available from new BLS study. Monthly Labor Review, 702(1), 76-80. 

Webb, G. R., Redman, S., Wilkinson, C., Sanson-Fisher, R. W. (1989). Filtering effects in reporting work injuries. Accident Analysis and Prevention, 21(2), 115-123. 

Liu, H. et al. (2008). The Pennsylvania Certified Safety Committee Program An Evaluation of Participation and Effects on Work Injury Rates. RAND Working Paper WR-594-PA. 

Habeck, Rochelle V. 1993. Achieving Quality and Value in Service to the Workplace. Work Injury Management 2(ji) 1,3-5. 

An employee, contractor, or subcontractor days away from work injury and/or fatality or... 

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