A case-crossover pilot study of slips, trips, and falls in health care workers.

Details

• Personal Author:
  Bell JL ; Collins, James H.W ; Courtney TK ; Gronqvist R ; Lombardi DA ; Sorock GS ; Wellman HM ; Wolf L
• Description:
  The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported in 1998 that slips, trips and falls (STF) account for the third largest proportion (20%) of non-fatal occupational injuries in private industry. Among health care workers in hospitals, the incidence rate of lost work-day injuries from STFs was 50% higher than the rate for all private industry (40.8 vs. 27.0 per 10,000 FTEs). We therefore began a case-crossover study to describe the circumstances of STFs in the hospital environment and to evaluate the role of potential transient risk factors in their occurrence. Health-care workers who reported a STF to the occupational health department in four mid-western hospitals were recruited into the study. Fifty-one subjects were interviewed by telephone. Eighty-eight percent were women with a mean age (SD) of 45 (12.3). Most subjects were nurses (47%), clerks/registrars (16%) or housekeeping staff (12%). Forty-three subjects (84%) reported falling preceded by a slip (44%), a trip (28%), neither (16%) or both a slip and a trip (12%). Of 51 STF events, pain (27%) and contusions (25%) were the most common injury outcomes; five subjects (10%) reported a fracture. Sixty-three percent of the STFs occurred while walking in a transitional area, e.g., fRom, William N.et to dry or dry to wet surfaces (33%), one type of floor surface to another (24%), or even-to-uneven surfaces (18%). The percent of subjects exposed to transient risk factors at the time of the STF were compared with the total person-time exposed to each factor in the previous work month. Preliminary analysis suggests that walking on a different pathway than usual, on contaminated floors (most often water or cleaning solutions), and being distracted or rushing may increase the risk of a STF in the hospital setting. The case-crossover design is a feasible method for studying the determinants of STF events.
• Subjects:
  Accidents, Occupational Chemistry Chemistry, Analytic Dust Environmental Monitoring Occupational Health Safety
• Keywords:
  Age-factors Demographic-characteristics Health-care Health-care-personnel Injuries Injury-prevention Medical-personnel Occupational-accidents Risk-factors Workers
• Publisher:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Document Type:
  Text
• Genre:
  Abstract ; Conference/Symposia Proceedings
• Place as Subject:
  OSHA Region 3 ; Pennsylvania ; West Virginia
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Division:
  DSR - Division of Safety Research
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  75
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20024227
• Citation:
  NOIRS 2003: Abstracts of the National Occupational Injury Research Symposium, October 28-30, 2003, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Pittsburgh, PA: National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, 2003 Oct; :75
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2004
• NORA Priority Area:
  Disease and Injury: Traumatic Injuries
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:7c7817641bf668b0933a66cdf79a69f804745f399ac448cc4c044a17d1f469f2b6920adfad3cb252769491971cbaa058a335ac24548e79db958ef591051c9c1a
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/181196/cdc_181196_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 15.34 KB ]