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G.W. Thompson and D.E.
Baker
NIOSH Education and Information Division
The
Extension Safety and Health Program, sponsored by the Univ.
of Missouri-Columbia (MU) and NIOSH has worked successfully
at targeting women in making safety and health a priority
on the farm and in the home. Recognizing the active role women
are taking in farming, we are training them to become safety
and health advocates.
A local
planning committee organizes the Farm Women's Safety and Health
Workshop. The one-day workshops have included: tractor and
machinery safety, chemical safety, livestock safety, basic
emergency first aid, fundamentals of hazard prevention, forage
equipment and storage, health hazards, harvest safety, fire
extinguishers, grain handling, purchasing parts, and hands-on
tractor safety.
Thirty-four
Farm Women's Safety and Health Programs have been presented
with 643 participants in a three-year period. The workshops
were highly rated with a mean score of 4.40 (1 being lowest
and 5 being highest rating).
Workshop
participants are asked to complete a safety questionnaire
at the beginning of each workshop. In the second year, 143
questionnaires were completed by workshop participants. Follow-up
mail surveys were mailed to second-year participants, after
allowing six months to one year for attitude and behavior
changes to occur. The questionnaire was completed and returned
by 96 of those surveyed (66% return rate). Significant gains
in safety practices were observed from the questionnaires.
Using the Chi-square analysis, of the sixty questions in the
questionnaire, twenty-three showed a statistically significant
difference in safety practices observed on the farm.
The
results of a Chi-square analysis showed a higher frequency
of participants that felt moderately to fully prepared in
determining what to do first in an accident situation (21.2%
increase from pre-response). A higher frequency of children
are always being turned down when they ask to ride on a tractor
(23.2% increase). Increases of 15.6% of the participants were
familiar with machinery operations of their farm. The Chi-square
analysis showed a higher frequency of participants that sometimes
and always wore seat belts with ROPS-equipped tractors (17.2%
increase). The analysis showed a higher frequency of machinery
operators that always avoid wearing loose or torn clothing
(39% increase).
Additional
survey results showed 79% of the participants were interested
in another Farm Women's Safety and Health Workshop. Forty-five
percent of the women that received notebooks from the workshops
have used these resources one to two times after the workshop.
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and Reproduction Information: Information in NASD does not represent
NIOSH policy. Information included in NASD appears by permission
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NASD Review: 04/2002
This
research abstract was extracted from a portion of the proceedings
of "Agricultural Safety and Health: Detection, Prevention and
Intervention," a conference presented by the Ohio State University
and the Ohio Department of Health, sponsored by the Centers
for Disease Control/National Institute for Occupational Safety
and Health.
G.W.
Thompson and D.E. Baker, University of Missouri, Columbia,
MO.
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