The need for detailed gender-specific occupational safety analysis (original) (raw)
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Women and Accidents: The Need to Separate Gender Database
Procedia Engineering, 2016
As female's participation in the US labor force continues to grow, there is a need to separate workplace injuries suffered by men and women. Statistics showed that women faced different types of injuries compared to men, especially on workplace violence. For example, women faced more fatality from workplace violence, and murders by personal acquaintances than men. The authors' study shows that women faced different types of workplace hazards and the risks have been increasing over the past years. Some analysis suggests that some jobs better protect women and the others. The study also finds that there is a lack of understanding of the different safety issues each gender faces, and the lack of data or separation of data between genders. This paper focuses on the main events of fatal and nonfatal injuries among women in all industries, especially on homicides and assaults to shed lights on the gender gaps on safety issues and the need for more gender-specific research and data.
Are female healthcare workers at higher risk of occupational injury?
Occupational Medicine, 2009
A total of 42 332 employees were included in the study of whom 11% were male and 89% female. When adjusted for age, occupation, sub-sector, employment category, health region and facility, female workers had significantly higher risk of all injuries [rate ratio (95% CI) 5 1.58 (1.24-2.01)] and MSIs [1.43 (1.11-1.85)] compared to their male colleagues.
Can safety risks of blue-collar jobs be compared by gender
Safety Science, 1994
Studies of accident rates use denominators which vary in their precision and detail. These imprecisions may impact differentially on accident rates of men and women, given their distribution across the labour market. Difficulties in making male/female comparisons were illustrated by a study of accidents and health symptoms among blue collar workers. We examined occupational health claims presented to the Quebec Occupational Health and Safety Commission by male and female municipal workers in 1989-1990, and interviewed 55 male and 58 female workers, asking questions on health symptoms and difficulties experienced on the job. No increase in accidents was found among permanent women workers compared with their male equivalents, and precipitating events and sites of injury were similar. However, the statistics were not strictly comparable. Four factors complexitied the male-female comparisons of accident rates: f 1) gender differences in hours worked, (2) gendered task assignments within industrial classi~cations, occupations and job titles, (3) gender differences in age/seniority, and (4) gender differences in the interaction between equipment and tool dimensions and work activity. Women were less senior, worked fewer hours and were assigned to a small minority of job titles. Interviews revealed a gendered division of labour within many supposedly integrated jobs, and use of different methods to do the same tasks. Men and women reported different musculoskeletal symptom profiles, which could be attributed to differences in tasks, biology or work methods. In view of these results, we suggest that comparing male and female accident rates be done with extreme prudence, taking into account women's and men's specific situations in the workplace.
Gender issues on occupational safety and health
Annali dell'Istituto superiore di sanita
The increasing proportion of women in the workforce raises a range of gender-related questions about the different effects of work-related risks on men and women. Few studies have characterized gender differences across occupations and industries, although at this time, the gender sensitive approach is starting to acquire relevance in the field of human preventive medicine. The European Agency for Safety and Health at Work has encouraged a policy of gender equality in all European member states. Italy has adopted European provisions with new specific legislation that integrates the previous laws and introduces the gender differences into the workplace. Despite the fact that gender equal legislation opportunities have been enacted in Italy, their application is delayed by some difficulties. This review examines some of these critical aspects.
XIV International Conference on Women Leadership And Empowerment, 2020
Construction has not been an obvious career choice for women all over the world as a result of the strongly held masculine perception that they are not suited for the industry and several other consequent challenges they encounter. The terrain of physical work and associated ergonomic hazards are two of such perceptions. Despite the advocacy for liberalisation and feminisation concerning gender roles, traditional stereotypes regarding occupational roles continue to dominate both in theoretical discourses and practice. Women all over the world constitute a minority in the construction workforce and compared to their male counterparts, have unique health and safety needs as construction work exposes them to high risks of injuries and fatalities. The paper reported on studies focusing on gender differences in occupational exposures and outcomes in the South African context as well as internationally. The study also highlights (i) gender considerations in workplace safety (ii) issues pertaining to women's occupational workplace health and safety in construction. The paper suggests that a gender-sensitive approach is required to address and accommodate the health and safety needs of women in construction.
Examination of Effect of Gender on Occupational Accident
The Eurasia Proceedings of Educational and Social Sciences, 2018
Competition among companies is increasing with the development of the technology and changing market conditions. Companies in this competitive environment need to reduce their costs (direct and indirect cost) and increase their productivity. Companies that want to reduce their costs should also give priority to occupational health and safety. So that in Turkey, legislation studies and programs about occupational health and safety are tried to gain the awareness of occupational helath and safety. Determining whether these studies are successful is only possible with statistical analyzes using past years' data. In Turkey, datas of work accident and occupational disease are published by Social Security Instution (SSI). In recent years, it has been seen that female employees take part in many sectors. In this study, in order to determine the effects of gender of occupational accidents, statistical analyzes were carried out in the sectors of "Electrical Equipment Manufacture" and "Manufacture of Textile Products" which female employees are more and most of the occupational accidents are experienced. After the analyzes, the relationship between the gender and living occupational accidents was determined and interpreted.
A gender perspective on work-related accidents
Safety Science, 2014
The key argument in the article is that a perspective on gender and masculinity could be beneficial to safety research. The aim is to outline a theoretical framework for combining gender research and safety research. In the first part of the article four strands of gender and masculinity theory relevant to safety researchers are introduced: The first position outlined is the theory of hegemonic masculinity which highlights the privileged position of men who represent dominant and legitimate form of masculinity. The next two positions outlined represent a classic distinction in gender theory between an approach conceptualizing gender as a relatively stable category and an approach underlining that gender is constantly produced and reproduced. Finally the notion of intersectionality which emphasizes the mutual interaction between different categories such as gender, class, age, and ethnicity is outlined. The second part of the article re-interprets two examples of existing outstanding safety research which have all been published in Safety Science. The two contributions are re-interpreted through a gender lens illustrating how gender and masculinity perspectives can be crucial for understandings of safety and the practices that lead to work-related accidents. The article concludes that the gender perspective is useful to expand the knowledge about safety and work-accidents in relation to for instance pride and bodily strength as well as the struggles between different masculinities.
BMC Public Health, 2013
Background: Prior research has shown increased risk of injury for female employees compared to male employees after controlling for job and tasks, but have not explored whether this increased risk might be moderated by manager gender. The gender of one's manager could in theory affect injury rates among male and female employees through their managers' response to an employee's psychosocial stress or through how employees differentially report injuries. Other explanations for the gender disparity in injury experience, such as ergonomic factors or differential training, are unlikely to be impacted by supervisor gender. This study seeks to explore whether an employee's manager's gender modifies the effect of employee gender with regards to risk of acute injury.
A GENDER SENSITIVE FRAMEWORK TO SAFETY AND HEALTH AT WORK
The aim of this paper was to formulate a strategy on how to take a gender sensitive approach when negotiating health and safety policies and procedures in the workplace. This was done by carrying out case studies on how companies are managing gender in their occupational health and safety policies, thereby highlighting the different health and safety risks that female and male workers are exposed to. The methodology was based on a structured questionnaire and direct observations to gather information from companies within a Southern African case country. Women's response to the questionnaire and the content of their answers were quite different from those of their male colleagues, indicating that industry is defined, to a large extent, in gender terms as far as working conditions are concerned. Literature from researches that have been carried out on occupational safety and health (OSH) pertaining to gender was reviewed. and it described differences in health at work by gender accounting for both psychosocial and physical hazards at work. The paper outlined a set of interesting lessons for academics, industry and safety practitioners by providing guidelines that will assist in ensuring a correct focus to select an appropriate safety performance evaluation model.
Occupational injury risk by sex in a manufacturing cohort
Occupational and environmental medicine, 2014
This study expands previous research comparing injury risk for women and men in a cohort of 24,000 US aluminium manufacturing workers in 15 facilities from 2001 to 2010. We compared injury rates (all injury, first aid, medical treatment, restricted work and lost work time) by sex and by job and sex. Using a mixed effect modelling approach, we calculated ORs and 95% CIs adjusting for age, job tenure, ethnicity and year as fixed effects and person, job and plant as random effects. Additionally, we modelled the data stratified by plant type to examine potential differences in injury risk between smelter (generally recognised as more hazardous) and fabrication production environments. Risk of injury was higher for women in four out of the five injury outcomes: all injuries combined (OR: 1.58, CI 1.48 to 1.67), injuries requiring first aid (OR: 1.61, CI 1.54 to 1.70), injuries requiring medical treatment (OR: 1.18, CI 1.03 to 1.36) and injuries requiring restricted work (OR: 1.65, CI 1.4...