Publications by authors named "Simo Salminen"

The aim of this study was to examine the effects of genetic and environment influences and sex on injury involvement using two sets of Finnish twin data. The younger participants were 955 twins born between 1983 and 1987, aged 20 to 24 years. The older participants were 12,428 twins born between 1930 and 1957, aged 33 to 60 years.

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Background: It is claimed that haste has increased in modern work life. Only a few studies on professional drivers show that haste increases the risk of occupational injury.

Objective: The aim of this study was to examine the relationship between haste and occupational injury in a large, representative sample of Finnish employees.

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Objectives: In Finland about 120,000 occupational injuries occur annually, the cost of which is over EUR 2 billion per year. This is why it is reasonable to analyze the effect of demographic factors like gender, age, tenure and mother tongue on occupational injuries.

Methods: The participants consisted of 1681 employees from four Finnish companies, who reported their injuries from the last 3 years.

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Background: A previous review showed that high stress increases the risk of occupational injury by three- to five-fold. However, most of the prior studies have relied on short follow-ups. In this prospective cohort study we examined the effect of stress on recorded hospitalised injuries in an 8-year follow-up.

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Background: Although injuries at school are an important issue in public health, environmental factors in schools and school yards have seldom been the focus of school injury research. The goal of our investigation was to examine the effect of environmental factors on school injuries.

Methods: Nine comprehensive Finnish schools registered school injuries over a period of two school years.

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Objectives: Burnout is a psychological consequence of prolonged work stress. Studies have shown that it is related to physical and mental disorders. The safety outcomes of burnout have been studied to a lesser extent and only in the work context.

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The aim of this study was to show the proportion of workplace accidents related to materials transfer and to decide whether they were more serious than other kinds of workplace accidents. The research material for this study were statistics and data, available in Finland, regarding workplace accidents and fatal accidents. Twenty-five percent of studied fatal accidents were related to materials transfer; 26.

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The study examined the relationships between work experience and (a) safety perceptions, (b) job satisfaction, (c) compliance with safety management policies and (d) accident frequency. Participants were Ghanaian industrial workers (N = 320). They were divided into 2 cohorts: experienced and inexperienced workers.

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Objectives: This study investigated the effect of a fixed-term job contract on encounters of violence at work. We assumed that fixed-term employees encountered more violence or threats of violence at their work than permanent employees.

Methods: This study is based on 3 large statistical data sets: (a) the Work and Health surveys carried out by the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health in 1997-2006 (n=7,519); (b) the so-called Victim study carried out by Statistics Finland in 2006, where 4088 working people were interviewed about victimization resulting in injuries and violence; and (c) another study from Statistics Finland, which interviewed 4 392 wage-earners about their working conditions in 2008.

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The association between disturbed sleep and increased risk of occupational injury has been observed in several cross-sectional and case-control studies, but prospective evidence is lacking. We examined prospectively whether sleep disturbances predicted occupational injuries in a large population of Finnish public sector employees. A total of 48 598 employees working in 10 municipalities and 21 hospitals in various parts of Finland were included.

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Problem: With baby boomers reaching retirement age, Western countries may need more immigrant workers to ensure productivity. Many studies have suggested a higher occupational injury frequency among immigrant workers, which could considerably reduce their contribution to society. The aim of this study was to examine whether immigrant workers have a higher injury frequency compared to Finnish workers when performing the exact same tasks under the same working conditions.

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The study examined the relationship between age and (i) safety perception; (ii) job satisfaction; (iii) compliance with safety management policies; and (iv) accident frequency. Participants were Ghanaian industrial workers (N=320) categorized into 4 age groups: 19-29 years; 30-39 years; 40-50 years; and 51 years and above. Workplace safety perception was assessed with Hayes, Perander, Smecko, and Trask's (1998) 50-item Work Safety Scale (WSS): a scale that effectively captures the dimensions identified by safety experts to influence perceptions of workplace safety.

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Objectives: This study reviewed the effectiveness of interventions in preventing occupational injuries among workers in agriculture.

Methods: Randomized controlled trials, controlled before-after studies, and interrupted time-series studies assessing interventions aimed at preventing injuries among workers in agriculture were considered. MEDLINE and five other databases were searched up to June 2006.

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The aim of this study is to analyze the gender differences in injuries at Finnish comprehensive schools. Nine schools reported a total of 1135 injuries to the injury register over two school years. Boys (56%) were injured more often than girls, their injuries happened more often during breaks at school yard, whereas girls hurt themselves during sport lectures in the gymnastic halls.

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The current study investigated the relationship between organizational safety climate and perceived organizational support. Additionally, it examined the relationship with job satisfaction, worker compliance with safety management policies, and accident frequency. Safety climate and supportive perceptions were assessed with Hayes, Perander, Smecko, et al.

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This study examined the effect of rest breaks on traffic accidents by 720 randomly selected professional drivers who completed a postal questionnaire. Drivers involved in an accident preferred to enjoy their breaks at rest places meant for professional drivers, whereas accident-free drivers chose more freely the timing of their breaks during driving.

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The aim of this study was to compare assessments made by Finnish- and Swedish-speaking workers in Finland about the safety climate in their companies, because an earlier study showed that the accident frequency of Swedish-speaking workers was one third lower than that of Finnish-speaking workers. 148 Finnish-speaking and 138 Swedish-speaking workers from 14 small and medium-sized companies participated in this study. They filled out a Finnish safety climate questionnaire, the reliability of which was above the acceptable level.

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The aim of this study is to explore the relationships between injuries at work and during leisure time. Three independent but similar data sets based on the National Work and Health Survey were analyzed. A total of 2156 subjects participated this study in 1997, 2053 subjects in 2000, and 2335 subjects in 2003.

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The study sought to explore management's responsibility in accident causation as perceived by Ghanaian and Finnish industrial workers. It was anticipated that the Ghanaian industrial workers would externalize accident causality more than their Finnish counterparts, and would assign only marginal responsibility to the management for industrial accidents. The predicted difference was based on the premise that the difference in these two cultures on the power-distance cultural dimensions would have an impact on their responsibility assignments.

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Problem: Two questions were posed in this global literature review: Do young workers have a higher occupational injury rate? Are the injuries of young workers more often fatal than those of older workers?

Method: The studies of nonfatal and fatal injuries were collected based on the following criteria: (a) published in peer-reviewed journals; (b) the young workers were under 25 years of age; (c) the injury rate or fatality rate of young workers and the overall rate was published; and (d) description of the population and the number of injuries was presented.

Results: The majority of 63 nonfatal studies reported showed that young workers had a higher injury rate than older workers. Twenty-nine out of 45 studies on fatal occupational injuries indicated that young workers had a lower fatality rate than older workers.

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The aim of this study is to examine two hypotheses. The first hypothesis proposes that left-handers have a higher injury risk than right-handers. The second hypothesis assumes that ambidextrous people have an elevated risk of injury compared with both right- and left-handers.

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This study examined the seriousness of traffic accidents that happen-either on work errands or during commuting. The article was based on three independently gathered data sets, of which two were based on compensation claims to the insurance companies (N=2,050 and N=17,108) and one on the interviews of victims (N=328). The traffic accidents at work led to a major injury or death more often than the commuting accidents.

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Background: Stress at work has long been recognized as a factor in increasing risk for mental and physical health problems. The extent to which work stressors and stress predicted injuries occur in a large population of Finnish hospital workers was studied.

Methods: A total of 5,111 employees (624 men, 4,487 women) from 10 hospitals participated in this study.

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The aim of this study was to discover accident factors specific to young workers, using two accident data sets gathered at the same time but with different methods. The first data set consisted of 99 serious occupational accidents, which occured in Southern Finland in 1988 and 1989. The second data set was based on the interview study of over 13,000 people of whom 792 were involved in an accident at work.

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