According to a new study from RAND Corp., states that report low numbers of nonfatal injuries among construction workers tend to have high rates of fatal injuries. For states with low fatality rates, the converse is true: they tend to report higher numbers of nonfatal injuries. The study was published in the April issue of the American Journal of Industrial Medicine.
"We were surprised by the relationship between fatal and nonfatal injuries," says John Mendeloff, the study's lead author and director of the RAND Center for Health and Safety in the Workplace. "One key factor influencing injury trends seems to be the scope of benefits offered by a state's workers' compensation program, but that explains only part of what we found."
Mendeloff says some might argue that the fatal and nonfatal injury rates should not be linked together because many causes of death are different than the causes of nonfatal injuries. However, he says few would have expected that the rates would be inversely related.
Mendeloff says the study demonstrates that it makes a great deal of difference which outcome measure is used to assess safety and health. Because fatality rates are measured quite accurately, the findings suggest that states reporting low nonfatal rates and high fatality rates are probably underreporting the former. Further, the study suggests that reporting more injuries may be a sign of a better worker safety program.
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