Journal of Occupational Accidents, 12 (1990) 99-104

Elsevier

99

ABSTRACTS*

Real Indirect Costs of Work Accidents: Results from Our New Model

BERNARD BRODY, PAUL C. ROHAN, YVES LBTOURNEAU and ANDRE? POIRIER

UniversitP de Mont&al and La Commission de la Santd et de la SkuritP du Travail du Qudbec,

I&. Relat: Industr., Montreal, QuC., Canada H3C 357

Indirect, hidden or uninsured costs of work accidents have been known since Heinrich publicized the concept in the early 1930s after studying thousands of accident files. Aside from Simonds very few researchers have made scientific attempts to ascertain the magnitude of indirect costs, and some skepticism prevails. The present paper reports results of a study carried out in 1988 in Quebec, Canada, covering 350 disabling work injuries in 13 manufacturing in- dustries. Average indirect costs are some $1100.00 and direct costs of about the same amount, yielding a ratio, indirect/direct costs of just under 1:l. This is hard evidence of the existence and extent of indirect costs of work accidents.

The second part of this paper innovates by presenting a multiple regression analysis with indirect costs as dependent variable and a series of nine explan- atory variables. The statistically significant variables are victim age, days lost, industrial sector, production capacity and establishment size.

Finally, a model is developed whereby an employer can estimate the indirect costs - and thereby real, total accident costs - in his establishment. It is expected that such new information will motivate firms to increase investment in prevention activities since cost savings are twice those previously believed.

Safety Climate in Construction Sites*

NICOLE DEDOBBELEER and FRANCOIS BfiLAND

Groupe de Recherche Interdisciplinaire en Santd, Faculty of Medicine, Universitk de Montreal,

CP 6128, Succursale A, Montreal, Qut?., Canada H3C 357

The purpose of this study was to determine the number of dimensions of safety climate in the construction industry. Safety climate has been defined by the perceptions that employees share about their work environments. As these perceptions serve as a frame of reference for guiding employees’ behavior, the

*Presented at the International Conference on Strategies for Occupational Accident Prevention,

Stockholm, Sweden, 21-22 September 1989.

0376-6349/90/$03.50 0 1990 Elsevier Science Publishers B.V.

100

accurate measurement of the safety climate becomes crucial. Holmes and Brown’s three-factor model (1986) was used as a guide to build our safety climate model. In this model, three factors were retained: (1) employee’s per- ception of how concerned management was with their well-being, (2 ) employ- ee’s perception of how active management was in responding to this concern, and (3 ) employee’s physical risk perception. Data was collected by self-admin- istered questionnaire in a cross-sectional survey conducted among 384 workers employed in nine non-residential construction sites, valued at $500 000 or more in the Baltimore Metropolitan Area. The response rate’was 71%. LISREL was used to test the Holmes and Brown’s model against alternative models with one and two factors. There were no significant differences of fit between the Holmes and Brown’s three-factor model and the two-factor model. Implica- tions for the use of such a model in the assessment of safety are discussed.

Production Organization, Accident Risk and Preventive Strategies in the Sawmill Industry

ESTHER CLOUTIER’ and LUCIE LAFLAMME’,’

‘Institut de Recherche en Sant6 et en SPcuritC du Travail du Quebec (IRSST), 505 Boul. de

Maisonneuue Ouest, Montrkal, Qud., Canada H3A 3C2

‘Swedish National Institut of Occupational Health and Safety, S-l 71 84 Solna, Sweden

A study was conducted to describe the accident risk prevailing in the Quebec sawmill industry in order to guide the development of strategies for accident prevention at the company level. It distinguished 3 types of production orga- nization among the mills, based on the number of human and mechanical re- sources used: (1) mills using several individuals per machine and few ma- chines, (2) those with fewer workers per machine and more machines, and (3) those using also fewer individuals per machine but the highest number of ma- chines. The frequency, severity and accidents occurring within each group of mills were compared.

Nine sawmills participated in the study, and the entire 728 accidents re- corded in the mills over 23 months were analysed. More than 60 variables were used. Frequency and severity rates were calculated for each group of mills and the significance of the differences was measured. Accident scenarios were ob- tained by multivariate analysis, and the relationship between type of accidents and type of mill was measured.

The results indicate that a difference in accident frequency and severity exists from one production process to another. They even suggest that the nature of the accident risk might itself change in this instance, thus requiring quite specific preventive countermeasures at the company level. Finally, some accident scenarios tend to arise in all types of processes and their correspond- ing preventive measures would thus be required everywhere.