Focus Groups in Health and Safety Research

Focus Groups ◽  
2010 ◽  
pp. 97-114 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger Haslam
Keyword(s):  
Focus Groups ◽  
Health And Safety ◽  
Safety Research

scholarly journals Laboratory Safety, Biosecurity, and Responsible Animal Use

ILAR Journal ◽  
2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica McCormick-Ell ◽  
Nancy Connell
Keyword(s):  
Health And Safety ◽  
Chemical Exposure ◽  
Mitigation Strategies ◽  
Worker Safety ◽  
Environmental Health And Safety ◽  
Safety Research ◽  
Education Levels ◽  
Animal Safety ◽  
Animal Care

AbstractResearch with animals presents a wide array of hazards, some of which overlap those in the in vitro research laboratory. The challenge for environmental health and safety professionals when making their recommendations and performing the risk assessment is to balance worker safety with animal safety/welfare. The care and husbandry of animals require procedures and tasks that create aerosols and involve metabolized chemicals and a variety of physical hazards that must be assessed in addition to the research related risks, all while balancing the biosecurity of the facility and NIH animal care requirements. Detailed communication between health and safety, research, and animal care teams is essential to understand how to mitigate the risks that are present and if modifications need to be made as the experiments and processes progress and change over time. Additionally, the backgrounds and education levels of the persons involved in animal research and husbandry can be quite broad; the training programs created need to reflect this. Active learning and hands-on training are extremely beneficial for all staff involved in this field. Certain areas of research, such as infectious disease research in high- and maximum-containment (biosafety level 3 and 4) facilities, present challenges that are not seen in lower containment or chemical exposure experiments. This paper reviews potential hazards and mitigation strategies and discusses unique challenges for safety at all biosafety levels.

scholarly journals Health and safety challenges associated with immigrant dairy workers

2013 ◽  
Vol 44 (2s) ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Rosecrance ◽  
T. Tellechea ◽  
L. Menger ◽  
D. Gilkey ◽  
N. Roman-Muniz
Keyword(s):  
Focus Group ◽  
Focus Groups ◽  
Dairy Industry ◽  
Health And Safety ◽  
Immigrant Workers ◽  
Work Practices ◽  
Worker Health ◽  
Safe Work ◽  
Worker Health And Safety ◽  
Large Herd

Faced with increasing industrialization, high demands on production, and decreasing domestic participation in the labor force, dairy producers are employing an immigrant workforce to help meet operational demands. There is little data regarding the number of immigrant workers in the dairy industry, but the trend of hiring immigrant workers in some of the world’s highest producing countries is increasing. There are many challenges associated with managing immigrant workers includinghow to effectively train this workforce about safe and efficient work methods. Methods: Ethnographic methods from the anthropology field served as the primary tool to identify barriers and facilitators of safe work practices in large-herd dairy operations in the United States. Following the weeklong emersion by the research anthropologist at a selected dairy, focus groups were organized at three large-herd dairies. All focus group conversations were tape recorded, transcribed and translated into English. The focus group transcripts were coded for specific themes related to issues that participants felt were barriers or facilitators of worker health and safety. Results: Twenty-two Latino workers 18 to 58 years of age participated in the three focus groups conducted at one Colorado and two South Dakota dairies. Six major themes relating to barriers and facilitators of worker health and safety were identified and included: communication, integration owner and worker cultures, work organization, leadership, support for animal health, and attention to safety culture within the organization. Conclusions: Although not often considered by agricultural engineers, an anthropological perspective to challenges involving an immigrant workforce may assist with improved work methods and safe work practices. Through this approach, agricultural engineers may better understand the cultural challenges and complexities facing the dairy industry. Successful integration of immigrant workers relies not only on cultural awareness but also the ability to integrate cultural knowledge, beliefs, values, and traditions into management and work practices.

scholarly journals Using the past to map out the future of occupational health and safety research: where do we go from here?

2019 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 90-127 ◽  
Author(s):  
Di Fan ◽  
Cherrie Jiuhua Zhu ◽  
Andrew R. Timming ◽  
Yiyi Su ◽  
Xinli Huang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Occupational Health ◽  
Health And Safety ◽  
Occupational Health And Safety ◽  
The Past ◽  
Safety Research ◽  
The Future

Pet owners’ perceptions of veterinary safety practices

2018 ◽  
Vol 183 (19) ◽  
pp. 594-594 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heather Fowler ◽  
Bianca Irimia ◽  
Vickie Ramirez ◽  
Hendrika Meischke ◽  
Peter Rabinowitz
Keyword(s):  
Focus Group ◽  
Focus Groups ◽  
Occupational Safety ◽  
Health And Safety ◽  
Worker Safety ◽  
Safety Practices ◽  
Safe Delivery ◽  
Pet Owners ◽  
Client Communication ◽  
Group Interviews

Veterinary workers must care for their animal patients while simultaneously protecting their own health and safety. This process can be complicated by the presence and perception of pet owners who may not agree with a given tactic used to protect veterinary workers from injury. We conducted focus groups of pet owners in the Seattle area during November 2016 to gain a deeper understanding of their perceptions relating to veterinary worker safety practices. Focus group interviews were recorded and transcribed and study themes identified and summarised. Twenty pet owners participated in three focus groups. Study themes arising from the focus group discussions could be categorised into human, animal, behavioural and environmental domains as outlined in a One Health Occupational Safety and Health (OHOSH) model. Communication was a recurring study theme identified, suggesting that lacking or impaired veterinary personnel-client communication plays a key role in the safe delivery of veterinary services and can negatively impact the use of safety practices among veterinary personnel. Our study suggests that it is important for veterinary personnel to communicate to clients the reasons for policies related to worker safety. Such communication can help engage the veterinary client in order to effectively avoid situations that precipitate injury.

scholarly journals A Safety Climate Framework for Improving Health and Safety in the Indonesian Construction Industry

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (20) ◽  
pp. 7462 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fatma Lestari ◽  
Riza Yosia Sunindijo ◽  
Martin Loosemore ◽  
Yuni Kusminanti ◽  
Baiduri Widanarko
Keyword(s):  
Construction Industry ◽  
Safety Climate ◽  
Management Practices ◽  
Occupational Injuries ◽  
Health And Safety ◽  
Working Environment ◽  
Cultural Norms ◽  
Safety Communication ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Safety Research

The Indonesian construction industry is the second largest in Asia and accounts for over 30% of all occupational injuries in the country. Despite the size of the industry, there is a lack of safety research in this context. This research, therefore, aims to assess safety climate and develop a framework to improve safety in the Indonesian construction industry. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected from 311 construction workers. The results show a moderately healthy safety climate but reflect numerous problems, particularly around perceived conflicts between production and safety logics, cost trade-offs being made against other competing project priorities, poor safety communication, poor working conditions, acceptance of poor safety as the norm, poor reporting and monitoring practices, poor training and a risky and unsupportive working environment which prevents workers from operating safely. Two new safety climate paradoxes are also revealed: contradictions between management communications and management practices; contradictions between worker concern for safety and their low sense of personal accountability and empowerment for acting to reduce these risks. A low locus of control over safety is also identified as a significant problem which is related to prevailing Indonesian cultural norms and poor safety policy implementation and potential conflicts between formal and informal safety norms, practices and procedures. Drawing on these findings, a new integrated framework of safety climate is presented to improve safety performance in the Indonesian construction industry.

scholarly journals Nanotechnology-Related Environment, Health, and Safety Research

2009 ◽  
Vol 117 (10) ◽  
Author(s):  
Giovanni Brandi ◽  
Elisabetta Nobili ◽  
Stefania Di Girolamo ◽  
Gianluca Grazi ◽  
Michelangelo Fiorentino ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Health And Safety ◽  
Safety Research
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