Abstract
ObjectivesThis study aimed to characterize injuries and illnesses among construction workers in the State of Oregon in the US and examine the association between injury frequency and severity with hour of work by using Workers’ Compensation (WC) accepted disabling claims data in the construction industry from 2007 to 2013.MethodsInjury frequency, rate, medical cost, and lost work days were analyzed by year, demographics, employment, injury nature, and temporal factors including hour of work. Multiple linear regression models were used to quantify adjusted associations between hour of work and medical cost and lost work days (indicating injury severity).ResultsThere were a total of 12 222 disabling claims in the Oregon construction industry. The average annual injury rate was 2.21 per 100 workers. Both the count and rate of disabling claims decreased during the study period. Male workers and young workers had higher injury rates, while medical cost and lost work days increased for older workers. Injuries occurring at night were more severe. The distribution of claims frequency by hour of work was bimodal, with peaks in the 4th and 8th hour. Compared with the first hour of work, the 5th and 13th hours corresponded to significantly more severe injuries and illnesses.ConclusionsThis study identified the burden and distribution of work‐related injuries and illnesses in the Oregon construction industry. Continued intervention efforts should target certain subpopulations (eg, young workers) and certain working time periods (eg, mid‐ and end‐shift) to protect construction workers’ safety and health.
Highlights
The construction industry has consistently been a high-risk industry worldwide
An important finding in this study is that hours in the middle of an 8-hour work shift and the 13th hour of work were significantly associated with more severe injuries and illnesses after adjusting for factors that were statistically associated with medical cost
This study reported on injury frequency and rate by year, demographics, employment, and temporal factors in the construction industry by analyzing the Oregon Workers’ Compensation (WC) accepted disabling claims data from 2007 to 2013
Summary
The construction industry has consistently been a high-risk industry worldwide. Compared with other industrial countries, the United States (US) had fairly high fatal and non-fatal injury rates.[1]. There were approximately 1000 work-related fatalities annually, corresponding to an occupational fatality rate of 9.5 per 100 000 full-time equivalent workers (FTEs). This is almost three times higher than the fatality rate for all private industries combined in the US The national rate of non-fatal occupational injuries and illnesses for construction workers was 3.0 per 100 FTEs in 2017. In the State of Oregon, the non-fatal work-related injury and illness rate in the construction industry was 1.6 times higher than the national rate in 2017.2. Workers’ Compensation (WC) claims data have been used to quantify work-related injuries and illnesses and to identify risk factors in different countries, including the US.[3-5]. There has been no analysis of recent Oregon WC claims data for the construction industry to our knowledge
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