Beyond the fireground: injuries in the fire service

Details

• Personal Author:
  Burgess JL ; Harris RB ; Peate WF ; Pollack KM ; Poplin GS
• Description:
  Background: Although firefighting and emergency medical services are high-risk professions, few studies have identified the aetiology of injury in the fire service beyond the fireground. Methods: Data were collected for work-related injuries in a medium-sized metropolitan fire department. In a descriptive study, the factors explored included the nature of injury, agent, mechanism, body location, environment, abbreviated injury scale (AIS), functional capacity index (FCI) and lost time status. Results: From 2004 to 2009, the annual injury incidence rate averaged 17.7 per 100 employees. One-third of all injuries (32.9 percent) resulted from physical exercise activities, while patient transport, training drills and fireground operations resulted in 16.9 percent, 11.1 percent and 10.2 percent of injuries, respectively. For all job operations, sprains and strains were the most prevalent type of injury (40.2-85.2 percent), followed by contusions and lacerations (7.7-26.1 percent). The third most common injury was related to the conventional hazards of the individual job operation. Most injuries (n=862, 95.6 percent) were minor in severity, while 4.3 percent of injuries were classified as having some impedance of normal function (FCI 3). Moderate injuries (AIS 2) were infrequent, but comprised a greater proportion of fireground injuries (8.7 percent) than the other activities (1.0-4.1 percent); however, lost time injuries were more frequent for patient transport (46.1 percent) than other operations 22.0-29.1percent). Conclusions: Physical exercise, patient transport and training activities were responsible for a greater percentage of injuries than fireground operations. Focused efforts to improve the characterisation of risks during these more diverse set of work processes should help guide the development of salient strategies for injury prevention. [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Emergencies Emergency Responders Firefighters Fires Mortality Occupational Exposure Occupational Health Safety
• Keywords:
  Emergency-responders Emergency-response Fire-fighters Fire-fighting Fire-hazards Injuries Injury-prevention Job-analysis Lost-work-days Mortality-data Mortality-rates Occupational-hazards Physical-exercise Physical-fitness Rescue-measures Rescue-workers Statistical-analysis Transport-mechanisms Traumatic-injuries Work-practices Worker-health

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• ISSN:
  1353-8047
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Grant
• Genre:
  Journal Article
• Place as Subject:
  Arizona ; Maryland ; OSHA Region 3 ; OSHA Region 9
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  228-233
• Volume:
  18
• Issue:
  4
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20040004
• Citation:
  Inj Prev 2012 Aug; 18(4):228-233
• Contact Point Address:
  Gerald S Poplin, 1656 E. Mabel, PO Box 24515, Tucson, AZ 85724, USA
• Email:
  poplin@email.arizona.edu
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2012
• NORA Priority Area:
  Public Safety
• Performing Organization:
  University of Arizona, Tucson
• Peer Reviewed:
  True
• Start Date:
  20090901
• Source Full Name:
  Injury Prevention
• End Date:
  20140831
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:46080edf69d9c79da7afe277db5fc2f7716f4e42a6e2d3938f3da759c17535185602318cf1aaf51245cdeaf78026cb3cf6a1a614200f6c685475b53f28ff3013
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/193021/cdc_193021_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 131.88 KB ]