Abstract. Falling from height is one of the major causes of fatalities in construction industry. The advancement and recent deployment of various sensing and mobile computing technologies on construction jobsite has provided an opportunity to achieve an autonomous safety monitoring system to prevent falling from height and hence improve safety performance of the industry. This paper presents the preliminary result of the first stage of the research on our envisioned autonomous safety monitoring system. In the paper, the authors defined the dynamic safe working zone model and its parameter determination. The safety knowledge introduced in this paper can serves as the foundation of actual system design and implementation.
1 Introduction
Although accident rate in construction industry has been decreasing, fallings from height consistently account for one of the greatest number of fatalities in our industry. Among all the causes contributing to falling from height, working surface and platform, worker’s behaviors and attitude, construction structure and facilities are three most mentioned causes in literatures (Hu etl, 2009). Works at height in construction industry usually take place in dynamic and complex environment and workers are not always aware of or do not have proper evaluation of surrounding risks. To maximize worker’s awareness of risks, existing practices include setting warning signs/barriers and using supervisors/colleagues to warn a worker if they happen to see him/her exposes to risks of falling. Recent advancement of sensing and ubiquitous computing technologies have been introduced to construction industry for material management to improve productivity and reduce material waste (Caldas 2006, Pradhan 2009). The inf...
... middle of paper ...
...ocuses on the implementation and validation of the proactive fall prevention system.
Works Cited
Hu, K., H. Rahmandad, T. Smith-Jackson and W. W. Winchester (2009). Factors influencing risk of falls: A review of evidence in construction. Under review at Construction Management and Economics
C.H. Caldas, D. Grau, C.T. Haas, Using Global Positioning System to Improve Materials-Locating Processes on Industrial Projects, Journal of Construction Engineering and Management, 132 (2006) 741-749
A. Pradhan, E. Ergen, B. Akinci, Technological Assessment of Radio Frequency Identification Technology for Indoor Localization, Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering, 23 (2009) 230-238.
OSHA. Safety and Health Regulations for Construction. Subpart M: Fall Protection. (1926).
OSHA. Occupational Safety and Health Standards. Subpart O: Machinery and Machine Guarding (1910).
Patient falls in the hospital is a serious issue and challenging problem that could lead to prolonged hospital stay, longer recovery time for patients, increased costs for hospitals, and a source of distress and anxiety for patients, nurses, and families. Patient falls can cause minor or major serious physical injury depending on the situation and the age of the client. In addition to the physical harms, patients can suffer from psychological injuries which make them lose their independence and confidence on themselves and build a lot of anger, distress and fears of falling.
Workers Health and Safety Perspective: Workers are required to be trained to learn about the possible hazards and solutions. For example, scaffolding, fall protection, excavations, etc. Workers are also required to wear necessary protective equipment during the construction process. In addition, workers have the right to negotiate for better working environment and get compensations if injured during construction.
If patient safety is the most important issue in Health Care facilities then how come hospital inpatient falls continue to be the most reported of all accidental falls (Tzeng & Yin, 2009)? Throughout the years, hospitals continue to make changes to decrease the risk of accidents and increase the quality of patient safety. With research studies and improvements made, patient falls still hold the largest portion of reported incidents in hospitals (Tzeng, & Yin, 2008). According to Tzeng & Yin (2008), “fall prevention programs apparently do not effectively reduce inpatient fall rates because of human factors and ergonomics in a hospital environment (p.179, para. 2). The two studies reviewed in this paper were performed with the hopes of decreasing the high fall rate among inpatients.
Currently it is commonly accepted among industries that musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) affect employees regardless of the occupation as well as cost that these injuries impose on the employer and the populace as a whole. Nevertheless, in the manufacturing business it is mostly common for individuals to perform manual materials handling (MMH) task that are believed to factor in on some of the most pricy job-related injuries to date, such as those attributed to the back. And although through the advancement of technology with the aid of robotics and the use of other equipment the need for MMH has been decreased, but certain jobs still require the need for humans to perform those kinds of tasks and this is more apparent in smaller manufacturing businesses or warehouses that cannot afford these advancements. With MSDs contributing to a large percentage of MMH injuries, with over 387,000 or 33 percent of all work related injury cases in 2011, far exceeding all other work related injuries (Occupational Safety & Health Administration, 2011). Maybe this is due to the well-known fact that MSDs are connected with jobs and tasks comprising of repetitive motions and exertion, together with such identifiable risk factors as awkward postures, use of force, and lack of recuperation before restarting the same task. Nonetheless, the best means of prevention is through the improvement of working conditions and the implementation of an ergonomics program. However, one of the principal challenges that face managers and supervisors today is the systematic approach to conduct an ergonomics evaluation and to use ergonomics consistently through a proactive approach with the aim at reducing MSDs either by engineering or administrative imp...
Falls are the leading cause of injuries, disabilities, and deaths among community-dwelling older adults (Moyer, 2012). According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC, 2016), each year one out of three community-dwelling older adults aged 65 years or above falls at least once. There is a need to identify effective interventions pertinent to the primary-care setting to prevent falls among older adults living in the community. The guideline titled “Prevention of falls in community-dwelling older adults: U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommendation statement” is focused on determining the effectiveness and harms of different fall-prevention interventions relevant to primary care for adults aged 65 years or above (Moyer,
Falls are a big concern for all employees in a hospital setting daily. The worst thing that can happen to a patient while being hospitalized is a fall, or a major fall, that could result in skin damage (i.e. wounds, skin tears, or abrasions), a fracture or break, thus limiting their independence. This student’s goal was to develop a way to educate staff members in ways they can help reduce the number of falls that occur. Developing a sample Fall Risk Prevention Policy as well as a Staff in-service on fall risk and Prevention achieved this goal.
When it comes to safety most people think they are safe, and they have a true understanding on how to work safe. Human nature prevents us from harming ourselves. Our instincts help protect us from harm. Yet everyday there are injuries and deaths across the world due to being unsafe. What causes people to work unsafe is one of the main challenges that face all Safety Managers across the world.
When taking steps to analyze and apply intervention strategies for falls, we must examine the factors that cause these occurrences. There are numerous reasons that falls occur, such as intrinsic and or extrinsic risk factors. Intrinsic risk factors for falls may be due to changes that are part of the normal aging process and acute or chronic conditions. According to Zheng, Pan and Hua et al. (2013), about 35-45 percent of individuals who are usually older than 65 years and other 50 percent of the elderly individuals report cases of fall every year. Extrinsic factors are those related to physical environment such as lack of grab bars, poor condition of floor surfaces, inadequate or improper use of assistive devices (Currie). Patient falls is not an easy thing to eliminate. With many clinical challenges, there’s no easy answer to the challenges posed by patient falls; howe...
We are part of world, which is fast moving and everyone has understanding of what can be achieved in healthcare, which is everyday reframed by advancement in technology and science. The challenge in today’s healthcare is to evaluate the continual discovery techniques and knowledge for effectiveness in a care delivery and applying in to practice. To deliver the most efficient, safe and effective patient care, it is important to adopt best available knowledge of nursing practices. It is very important for a nurse to be clinical expertise, know the preferences of patient and values of most updated research evidence.
Falling mainly occurs when a person is not careful. Proper prevention methods are to be taken in order to eradicate this risk once and for all. There is clear evidence based solution that is managing exercise program at home and walking practice under the qualified health care professional it can prevent falls among older community residents (Balzer, 2012). The evidence based care for patient’s high risk of fall is vital in recognizing more efficient treatments and physical therapy to prevent injury, and to ensure optimal patient outcomes. My proposed solution to the issue of fall incidence to education the patient and family members, and the use of call light, bed and chair alarm. During patient care I always conscious about use of tools visually such as, yellow socks, yellow tag, and magnets on patient locater board also. (Forrest et al.,2006). Maintaining a safe and comfortable environment is the responsibility of the hospital independent of a patient's particular risks for falls, because failure to do so can put any patient at risk. One hourly rounding is always for protection because it reduces patients' need to use the call light to ask for help and therefore decreases the number of unscheduled call lights that require response. These
As in the today world patient safety in the health care centers is most important thing in the world. Indeed, in many countries the first priority is given to the patient safety in health care centers. For example, according to the various studies worldwide, a survey was conducted in the united states in the year 1999 where 44,000 to 98,000 deaths happened due the human mistakes. Even though, after achieving success in the advancement of health care there’s no improvement in patient safety. Moreover, organizations such as a) International Organization for Standardization, b) Joint Commission c) Occupational Health Safety and Safety Advisory Services have adopted certain mechanisms for improvement
Fall is sudden, unpredicted, unintentional occurrence resulting in-patient landing on ground or at lower level. Falls and fall related injuries incur cost for the patient as well as the health cares system. The fall has a significant impact in patient quality of life and usually fall has many reasons to happen. Thus, preventing falls among patients in healthcare settings requires a complex approach, and recognition, evaluation and prevention of patient falls are significant challenges. Falls are a common cause of injury and the leading cause of nonfatal injuries and trauma-related hospitalizations in the United States (Barton, 2009). Falls occur in all types of healthcare institutions and to all patient populations. Up to 12% of hospitalized patients fall at least once during their hospital stay (Kalisch, Tschannen, & Lee, 2012). It has been using different strategies in many hospitals to prevent or at least to decrease the incidence of fall. However, the number of falls in the hospitals increases at alarming rate in the nation. The hospitals try to implement more efficient intervention strategies, but the number fall increase instead of decrease. In fact, many interventions to prevent falls and fall-related injuries require organized support and effective implementation for specific at risk and vulnerable subpopulations, such as the frail elderly and those at risk for injury.
Authorities have attempted to implement codes or regulations, but that has proved to be very difficult tasks becasue there are many variables that effect the dynamic response of buildings. One way to try to avoid disaster is to evaluate seismic risk is to look at a buildings hazards, exposure, vulnerability, and location. Hazards are, for example, landslides ad soil type. Exposure is a building's occupancy and function. Vulnerability is the expected performance of a building's system, and location is how often earthquakes occur in the area. (Lagorio)
Accidents at work can occur at any time and there are a lot of consequences and considerations, especially for the injured worker. Industrial workers or people who deal with heavy objects are not the only one at risk of getting into
Construction is one of the most dangerous works during this era. The advanced technologies are to be utilized in the construction work but still it is not really safe work. Many of the human beings are now involved in the construction work. It is one of the most typical working fields. Most of the persons who have lack of knowledge, degree and skills join the construction teams in order to earn living. It is said that most of the workers related to the construction industry are not really well educated. This becomes that major cause of their less focus on the work. This proved sometimes very critical condition. One of the most important things in this regard is that workers sometimes not really work with taking great care.