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Near miss and minor occupational injury: Does it share a common causal pathway with major injury?
Author(s) -
Alamgir Hasanat,
Yu Shicheng,
Gorman Erin,
Ngan Karen,
Guzman Jaime
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
american journal of industrial medicine
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.7
H-Index - 104
eISSN - 1097-0274
pISSN - 0271-3586
DOI - 10.1002/ajim.20641
Subject(s) - minor (academic) , medicine , injury prevention , occupational safety and health , human factors and ergonomics , poison control , near miss , medical emergency , forensic engineering , pathology , political science , law , engineering
Background An essential assumption of injury prevention programs is the common cause hypothesis that the causal pathways of near misses and minor injuries are similar to those of major injuries. Methods The rates of near miss, minor injury and major injury of all reported incidents and musculoskeletal incidents (MSIs) were calculated for three health regions using information from a surveillance database and productive hours from payroll data. The relative distribution of individual causes and activities involved in near miss, minor injury and major injury were then compared. Results For all reported incidents, there were significant differences in the relative distribution of causes for near miss, minor, and major injury. However, the relative distribution of causes and activities involved in minor and major MSIs were similar. The top causes and activities involved were the same across near miss, minor, and major injury. Conclusions Finding from this study support the use of near miss and minor injury data as potential outcome measures for injury prevention programs. Am. J. Ind. Med. 52:69–75, 2009. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.