Modeling of Individual and Organizational Factors Affecting Traumatic Occupational Injuries Based on the Structural Equation Modeling: A Case Study in Large Construction Industries

Background: Individual and organizational factors are the factors influencing traumatic occupational injuries. Objectives: The aim of the present study was the short path analysis of the severity of occupational injuries based on individual and organizational factors. Materials and Methods: The present cross-sectional analytical study was implemented on traumatic occupational injuries within a ten-year timeframe in 13 large Iranian construction industries. Modeling and data analysis were done using the structural equation modeling (SEM) approach and the IBM SPSS AMOS statistical software version 22.0, respectively. Results: The mean age and working experience of the injured workers were 28.03 ± 5.33 and 4.53 ± 3.82 years, respectively. The portions of construction and installation activities of traumatic occupational injuries were 64.4% and 18.1%, respectively. The SEM findings showed that the individual, organizational and accident type factors significantly were considered as effective factors on occupational injuries’ severity (P < 0.05). Conclusions: Path analysis of occupational injuries based on the SEM reveals that individual and organizational factors and their indicator variables are very influential on the severity of traumatic occupational injuries. So, these should be considered to reduce occupational accidents’ severity in large construction industries

Providing an early warning framework to identify, assess and control human performance influencing factor in automotive industry

Background and aims: Accident root causes' analysis shows optimization of factors affecting performance has an essential role in reducing of accidents. These factors are dynamic and complex and they may also be dependent to each other. Therefore, a comprehensive analysis of the working environment is essential. The main objective of this study was to propose a framework to control human performance influencing factors in a automotive industry in Iran. Methods: The present study provided an early warning model that predicts the risk factors affecting human performance. Since behavioral factors that are causing errors are complex in structure, FANP method was used for modeling. Using the proposed model, the potential risk of workplace determined before it leads to accidents and based on the type and level of risk and risk control measures was determined. The model was tested on two major projects in the car manufacturing industry. Results: The results show that the risk indexes in the first and second project are 0.391 and 0.197 respectively. Since the value of the index in the first project is greater than the amount authorized by the model so corrective action suggested in accordance with identified risk factors without stopping the system. Conclusion: The system can predict and assess the performance influencing factors as an early warning system. As a result, this system will lead to improved performance and enhanced safety

Evaluation of the relationship between unsafe acts and occupational accidents in a vehicle manufacturing

Background and aims   Vehicle manufacturing industries are as critical sites from points of safety. Unsafe acts and unsafe conditions have been recognized as effective factors in increasing the risk of occupational accidents. In order to promote of safety conditions, it's necessary to evaluate unsafe acts of workers as the main reason of accidents. The main goal of research is evaluation of relationship between unsafe Acts with occupational accidents.   Methods   Safety behavior sampling (SBS) technique was employed to conduct this study. After doing a pilot study, the number of samples and views were determined 195 and 3456  respectively. The information was then analyzed using Excel, SPSS and statistic tests.   Results  &nbsp;The results of the study showed that the rate of unsafe acts of studying workers was  35.4% .The study of the relationship between unsafe acts and occupational accidents via Regression Logistic test showed that if one percent increases on unsafe acts, the rate of accidents  multiply three.   Conclusion   Therefore in view of this significant correlation between unsafe acts and  occupational accidents and kind of unsafe acts, reducing or eliminating requires the investment and implementation of a program. It should be associated with behavioral safety principles and emphasis should be placed on implementing safety culture fundamentals at all organizational levels

Assessment of musculoskeletal disorders in a manufacturing company using QEC and LUBAmethods and comparison of results

Background and aims   Musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) are the most important causes of workers disabilities, increasing compensations and reducing productivity in developed and developing countries. This study was aimed to determine prevalence of musculoskeletal disorders and assessment of them by using QEC and LUBA methods and comparison of results in a manufacturing company in Iran.     Methods   This descriptive-analytical study was performed on 115 operators in 15 working stations by using QEC and LUBA methods. The prevalence of MSDs was obtained by using Nordic Musculoskeletal Questionnaire (NMQ). The data were analyzed by Spearman correlation coefficients.     Results   According to findings of NMQ, 81.4 percent of operators at least in one of nine parts of musculoskeletal system have pain since 12 months ago. Assessment with QEC and LUBA  revealed that 71.3 and 24.35 percent of operators respectively are in action level four.     Conclusion   According to the analysis, correlation between findings of NMQ and action levels in QEC is higher than LUBA action levels. Whereas LUBA just assess working postures, this method is not a suitable tool for evaluation of working stations that require repetitive carrying of loads, static posture and long time to do.

Development of the Health, Safety and Environment Excellence Instrument: a HSE-MS Performance Measurement Tool

AbstractQuality and effectiveness are vital factors in health, safety and environment management systems. In order to move towards the goal of increasing quality, to achieve best results, to reach the continuous improvement of system services and productions, and also to make the internal and external customers satisfied, it is necessary to consider the system performance measurement. This study was aimed to represent Health, Safety and Environment Excellence Instrument to measure the performance of a wide range of health, safety and environment management systems. The development of the proposed tool overall structure, its principles, and its test results in three different contractors of MAPNA Group are presented in this article. Test results in three organizations revealed that, on the whole, the instrument has the ability to measure the performance and efficiency of health, safety and environment management systems in a wide range of systems

Assessment of the costs of fatal occupational accidents in Tehran

Background: Occupational accidents are major health problems in both developed and developing countries. The most important aspect is death leading to loss of years of life and work. The objective of this study is evaluation of human costs of fatal occupational accidents in the insured employees by Human Capital method in Tehran. Materials and Methods: Data for this study were collected through specific checklists filled in by referring to the branches of the Social Security Organization. Human costs were calculated by determination of the lost years of life, years of active economic function as well as annual income of the deceased people. Results: In the three years of the study 7552 years of life and 3656 years of work have been lost because of the occupational accidents. Findings also showed that human cost for each occupational accident was 3.36 billion Rials. Human costs of fatal occupational accidents for each year of study was found to be equal to 0.03 percent of Iran's GDP. Conclusion: Very high expenses of occupational accidents mandates more attention to the occupational health and safety services

Evaluation of implementation an Integrated Safety and Preventive Maintenance System for Improving of Safety Indexes

Accident analysis shows that one of the main reasons for accidents is non-integration of maintenance units with safety. Merging these two processes through an integrated system can reduce and or eliminate accidents, diseases, and environmental pollution. These issues lead to improvement in organizational performance, as well. The aim of this study is to design and establish an integrated system for obtaining the aforementioned goal. Integration was carried out at Nirou Moharreke Machine Tools Company via Structured System Analysis & Design Method (SSADM). In order to measure the effectiveness of the system, selected indexes were compared using statistical methods prior and after system establishment. Results show that the accident severity index reduced from 135.46 in 2010, to 43.85 in 2012. Moreover, system effectiveness improved equipment reliability and availability (e.g. reliability of the Pfeiffer Milling machine (P (t>50)) increased from 0.89 in 2010, to 0.9 in 2012. This system by forecasting various failures, and planning and designing the required operations for preventing occurrence of these failures, plays an important role in improving safety conditions of equipment, and increasing organizational performance, and is capable of presenting an excellent accident prevention program

Representation of a Method for Identification of the Best Safe Contractors by Fuzzy Input Efficiency Profiling and AHP

Background and Aims Health, Safety and Environment (HSE) performance measurement of the contractors and identification of the best ones can make a perception of the past changes in their HSE performance. Consequently, this may motivate them and provide an opportunity to improve their quality of services. The aim of this study is to rank the contractor-companies of one of the Iranian steel manufacturing companies considering their safety behavior and also to determine the best combination of contractors-companies.   Methods safety behavior sampling method used to determine the status of unsafe acts. The fuzzy efficiency numbers of each input were ranked by Chen & Klein method. To obtain a final ranking AHP was applied. The obtained rankings by FIEP-AHP were compared to the ranking of DEA.   Results Results indicated that the most frequent unsafe behaviors were related to not-using or miss-using the PPE, using broken tools and inappropriate working condition respectively. A significant relationship between experience, education and age with safety behaviors was obtained (p<0.05). Results showed that companies’ number 2 and 6 had respectively the best and worst ranks.   Conclusion Because FIEP increases the power of recognition especially when the number of DMUs is lower than inputs and outputs, it can be suggested as an appropriate model for determining the best contractor companies