A controlled case study of supervisor training to optimize response to injury in the food processing industry

The role of supervisors to aid injured workers, access health care, and provide reasonable accommodation may prevent prolonged disability among workers reporting musculoskeletal pain. Although supervisor training has been a common element of broad-based ergonomic interventions to prevent injuries, the impact of supervisor training alone to improve injury response has not been studied. In a controlled design, 11 supervisors in an intervention group and 12 supervisors in a delayed intervention control group from the same plant were provided a 4-hour training workshop. The workshop emphasized communication skills and ergonomic accommodation for workers reporting injuries or health concerns. Workers' compensation claims data in the 7 months before and after the workshop showed a 47% reduction in new claims and an 18% reduction in active lost-time claims versus 27% and 7%, respectively, in the control group. Improving the response of frontline supervisors to employees' work-related health and safety concerns may produce sustainable reductions in injury claims and disability costs.     

Factors affecting the organizational responses of employers to workers with injuries

The organizational responses of employers to work-related injuries is one of several significant influences on return-to-work outcomes. Thus, understanding the factors that lead to better or worse organizational responses to work injuries may ultimately help to improve success in this area. The purpose of this study was to systematically explore factors that might influence the organizational responses of employers to injured workers, based on employee perceptions. Cross-sectional survey data were collected from 2,943 subjects with work-related injuries which had occurred less than eight weeks prior to survey completion. Measured variables included pre-injury demographic and job factors, injury circumstances, and a measure of post-injury events that comprised the organizational response. Multivariate linear regression results show that age, gender, job dissatisfaction before injury, prior difficulty performing job tasks, injury severity, back injury and lost time were all associated with negative organizational responses, suggesting potential opportunities for intervention.     

Identifying the time of change in the mean of a two-stage nested process

Statistical process control charts are used to distinguish between common cause and special cause sources of variability. Once a control chart signals, a search to find the special cause should be initiated. If process analysts had knowledge of the change point, the search to find the special cause could be easily facilitated. Relevant literature contains an array of solutions to the change-point problem; however, these solutions are most appropriate when the samples are assumed to be independent. Unfortunately, the assumption of independence is often violated in practice. This work considers one such case of non-independence that frequently occurs in practice as a result of multi-stage sampling. Due to its commonality in practice, we assume a two-stage nested random model as the underlying process model and derive and evaluate a maximum-likelihood estimator for the change point in the fixed-effects component of this model. The estimator is applied to electron microscopy data obtained following a genuine control chart signal and from a real machining process where the important quality characteristic is the size of the surface grains produced by the machining operation. We conduct a simulation study to compare relative performances between the proposed change-point estimator and a commonly used alternative developed under the assumption of independent observations. The results suggest that both estimators are approximately unbiased; however, the proposed estimator yields smaller variance. The implication is that the proposed estimator is more precise, and thus, the quality of the estimator is improved relative to the alternative.     

Trauma screening in students attending a medical university

Clinicians seldom assess trauma history in patients who seek treatment for psychological problems, yet trauma exposure is often related to psychological distress. Assessing trauma history can provide valuable information for treatment conceptualization and provision, although patients may not spontaneously share their histories because of embarrassment, avoidance, or other concerns. The authors compared 73 students at a southeastern US medical university who sought counseling and psychological services and completed intake paperwork without a trauma screen with 130 students whose intake procedures included trauma screening. They found that (a) patients who were specifically asked about trauma history were more likely to report such events, (b) previous physical assaults with a weapon were related to current psychological distress, and (c) physical assaults with or without a weapon were related to clinically significant psychological distress. These findings suggest that screening for lifetime trauma history should be a standard part of mental health screenings in similar medical university counseling centers.     

Goal-oriented evaluation for program planning: A case study

Utilizing a contextual model of evaluation, a goal-oriented method was applied to the Health Psychology program, a doctoral program in its early stages at the University of California, San Francisco. There were five stages involved in implementing this method: (1) clarification of the goals and objectives of the program, (2) prioritizing the objectives, (3) judging the attainment of the objectives, (4) organization of faculty/student input, and (5) feedback to the program management. All faculty members and students were invited to participate as selfevaluators in this evaluation effort. The results indicated that there were significant differences between the faculty group and the student group on their ranking and rating of the importance of specific educational and resource objectives. A one year follow-up was obtained by interviewing the director of the program to assess the impact of the project on program planning. The advantages and disadvantages of the approach were discussed in light of this attempt to analyze a new educational program.     

Treating and Drinking Well Water in the Presence of Health Risks from Arsenic Contamination: Results from a U.S. Hot Spot

The Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974 regulates water quality in public drinking water supply systems but does not pertain to private domestic wells, often found in rural areas throughout the country. The recent decision to tighten the drinking water standard for arsenic from 50 parts per billion (ppb) to 10 ppb may therefore affect some households in rural communities, but may not directly reduce health risks for those on private wells. The article reports results from a survey conducted in a U.S. arsenic hot spot, the rural area of Churchill County, Nevada. This area has elevated levels of arsenic in groundwater. We find that a significant proportion of households on private wells are consuming drinking water with arsenic levels that pose a health risk. The decision to treat tap water for those on private wells in this area is modeled, and the predicted probability of treatment is used to help explain drinking water consumption. This probability represents behaviors relating to the household's perception of risk.