Occhealth Bulletin
09 April 2010
Is working for the Electric Utility Industry a pain in the neck?
Category: Reviews
Workers in many industries (eg construction) often face a number of physical hazards (eg awkward postures, sprains and strains) when carrying out their normal work-associated tasks. This in turn can have an economic impact on an organization from work days lost thru sickness, decreased productivity and compensation claims. An understanding how such injuries occur, their incidence and the impact on the organization aids the development of prevention strategies to reduce the risks of them happening.
A recent study by Fordyce and co-workers aimed to describe the incidence and impact of neck injuries among workers in the electric utility industry. They utilized injury surveillance data from the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) Occupational Health and Safety Database (OHSD) which provided information from 17 companies over a 13 year (1995-2007) period. Eight of the utility companies provided data for the whole period whereas the remaining nine companies provided information for some sections of this time period. The researchers analyzed overall data and also by demographic group (age, sex and occupation) and nature of injury. They also focused their analyses on three areas to determine situations with increased risk of injury: i) motor vehicle accidents ii) overexertion/body motion and iii) “other” activities including struck by animal/insect bite, falls and contact with electric current. Although the researchers determined that neck injury rates were decreasing statistically, over the study years, they calculated an overall neck injury rate of 13.3 per 10,000 employee years. Most common types of injuries reported were strains and sprains (69.2%) followed by contusions and bruising (6.9%).
Overexertion/body motion (29.2%) was found to be the most common source of reported injury followed by neck injuries resulting from motor vehicle crashes (22.7%). There was a slightly higher rate of neck injuries in men than women (although not statistically significant) and younger workers under the age of 30 had a higher rate than older workers. Of the occupations analyzed, trade/craft workers (eg meter readers, line crew workers, mechanics) experienced higher rates of neck injuries compared to office-based workers (eg managers, administrative staff, engineers).
The researchers concluded that this is the first study to characterize neck injuries in workers in the electric utility industry and the research could be used to hypothesize in areas where further study would be beneficial. Industry-wide surveillance of injury data helps to identify injury patterns and mostly likely causes of injuries. Such studies provide the information needed to help inform intervention and prevention programs to reduce the risk of injuries, and associated medical costs, occurring in the future.
REFERENCE: Fordyce, TA., Morimoto, L., Coalson, J. Kelsh, MA. and Mezei, G. (2010) Neck injuries among electric utility workers, 1995-2007. Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.
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