title: The development of a conceptual model and self-reported measure of occupational health and safety vulnerability.
abstract: Injuries at work have a substantial economic and societal burden. Often groups of labour market participants, such as young workers, recent immigrants or temporary workers are labelled as being "vulnerable" to work injury. However, defining groups in this way does little to enable a better understanding of the broader factors that place workers at increased risk of injury. In this paper we describe the development of a new measure of occupational health and safety (OH&S) vulnerability. The purpose of this measure was to allow the identification of workers at increased risk of injury, and to enable the monitoring and surveillance of OH&S vulnerability in the labour market. The development included a systematic literature search, and conducting focus groups with a variety of stakeholder groups, to generate a pool of potential items, followed by a series of steps to reduce these items to a more manageable pool. The final measure is 29-item instrument that captures information on four related, but distinct dimensions, thought to be associated with increased risk of injury. These dimensions are: hazard exposure; occupational health and safety policies and procedures; OH&S awareness; and empowerment to participate in injury prevention. In a large sample of employees in Ontario and British Columbia the final measure displayed minimal missing responses, reasonably good distributions across response categories, and strong factorial validity. This new measure of OH&S vulnerability can identify workers who are at risk of injury and provide information on the dimensions of work that may increase this risk. This measurement could be undertaken at one point in time to compare vulnerability across groups, or be undertaken at multiple time points to examine changes in dimensions of OH&S vulnerability, for example, in response to a primary prevention intervention.
authors.affiliation: Institute for Work & Health, 481 University Avenue, Suite 800, Toronto, ON M5G 2E9, Canada; School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Monash University, The Alfred Centre, 99 Commercial Road, Melbourne, Victoria 3004, Australia; Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, 155 College Street, 6th Floor, Toronto, ON M5T 3M7, Canada. Electronic address: psmith@iwh.on.ca.
authors.forename: Peter M
authors.initials: PM
authors.lastname: Smith
authors.affiliation: Institute for Work & Health, 481 University Avenue, Suite 800, Toronto, ON M5G 2E9, Canada; School of Public Policy & Governance, University of Toronto, Canadiana Gallery, 3rd Floor, 14 Queen's Park Cres. West, Toronto, ON M5S 3K9, Canada.
authors.forename: Ron
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Saunders
authors.affiliation: Institute for Work & Health, 481 University Avenue, Suite 800, Toronto, ON M5G 2E9, Canada.
authors.forename: Marni
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Lifshen
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Monash University, The Alfred Centre, 99 Commercial Road, Melbourne, Victoria 3004, Australia.
authors.forename: Ollie
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Black
authors.affiliation: Institute for Work & Health, 481 University Avenue, Suite 800, Toronto, ON M5G 2E9, Canada.
authors.forename: Morgan
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Lay
authors.affiliation: Institute for Work & Health, 481 University Avenue, Suite 800, Toronto, ON M5G 2E9, Canada; Seneca College, 1750 Finch Avenue East, Toronto, ON M2J 2X5, Canada.
authors.forename: F Curtis
authors.initials: FC
authors.lastname: Breslin
authors.affiliation: School of Health & Social Development, Deakin University, 221 Burwood Highway, Burwood, Victoria 3125, Australia.
authors.forename: Anthony D
authors.initials: AD
authors.lastname: LaMontagne
authors.affiliation: Institute for Work & Health, 481 University Avenue, Suite 800, Toronto, ON M5G 2E9, Canada; Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, 155 College Street, 6th Floor, Toronto, ON M5T 3M7, Canada; Department of Economics, McMaster University, Kenneth Taylor Hall, Rm 426, 1280 Main Street West, Hamilton, ON L8S 4M4, Canada.
authors.forename: Emile
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Tompa
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001955:British Columbia; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D016272:Occupational Health; D060051:Occupational Injuries / Q000209:etiology* / Q000517:prevention & control*; D009864:Ontario; D018570:Risk Assessment; D057566:Self Report; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Prevention; Vulnerability; Work injury