Journal of Health and Safety at Work

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Introduction: Traffic transportation system despite of benefits is one center of accident.According to studies, human factors as unsafe acts and drivers mistakes are causes of accidenta happening. The main objective of this study was to Study of unsafe behaviors among city bus drivers in Hamadan.

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Method and Materials: This cross-sectional study was conducted in spring of 2011. Fifty four drivers were chosen using simple random sampling among Hamadan city bus drivers. The required data gathered by using safety behavior sampling technique. Data analysis was done with Statistical tests such as t-test and one-way ANOVA.

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Results: The study results indicated that %42.71 of driver’s behaviors were unsafe. Double Park (%24.71), speaking (%14.99) and unsafe grasping the steering wheel (%12.46) allocated to highest percentages of unsafe behaviors. Also it was shown the rates of unsafe acts were increased in younger and low income drivers, apparently.

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Conclusion: Because of high percent of unsafe acts and considering importance of its consequences in drivers, reducing unsafe acts trough investment and utilization of behavioral safety principles is required. In this regard, holding educational careers are suggested to increasing driver’s awareness.

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Introduction: Every year thousands of people in Iran loss their lives in traffic accidents. Any those accidents, motorcycle accidents are fatal. Safety attitude is a predictor of risky behavior. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between personality, attitudes to safety and risky behaviors.

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Material and Method: In this study 254 motorcycle drivers were randomly selected in Tehran city, and they were asked to complete personality, the attitude to safety and risky behaviors questionnaire.

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Result: A statistically significant correlation was found between different domains of personality (fear, anger, Emotional styles, altruism, anomaly) and attitude to safety (traffic flow in obedience to the law, driving speed, driving excitement), (P = 0/001). Also between personality and attitude to safety the relationship was statistically significant (p = 0/001).

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Conclusion: Attitude to safety is a predictor for risky behavior. Personality also the impact indirectly on the attitude to safety have and risky behaviors.

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Introduction: Application of agricultural machineries such as tractor has been yielded a considerable development in different agricultural activities and productions. However, noticeable health problems such as noise pollution impact the users of these off-road vehicles. The purpose of this study was to determine the noise level induced by agricultural tractors and to evaluate the driver’s noise exposure level.

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Material and Method: The sound pressure levels of three brands of tractor include John Deere, Ferguson and Romani were measured by sound level meter model Tes-1358. The characteristics of place for measuring tractors noise pollution were determined based on the ISO standard No 7216, 5131. The acquired data was analyzed using spss16 software.

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Result: The results showed that the highest and the lowest noise level around the tractors were 83.8 dB (A) and 73.9 dB (A) for the John Deere and Romani, respectively. The effect of different transmission gears on the noise level of tractors was not statistically significant Pvalue>0.05. While, the effect of the tractor engine speeds on the noise level was statistically significant Pvalue<0.01. The exposure time of the most of drivers was frequently about 8 hour or more In this regards, the exposure levels of the tractor’s drivers to noise measured between 85-90 dB (A) were higher than the Iranian occupational exposure limit (85 dB (A)).Moreover, mean noise reduction rate of exsisting room which was used upon the typical tractor’s body was 9.5 dB in one octave band.

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Conclusion: Application of standard cockpit and expansion mufflers can effectively reduce noise pollution emission and driver’s occupational exposure. Moreover, regular preventive maintenance and effective hearing conservation program including annual audiometry, hearing protection device, occupational health training for drivers must be implemented.

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Introduction: Whole body vibration occurs when human is on a vibrating surface and the vibration influences parts of the body which are far from the contacted part. Up to now, various health-related problems due to whole body vibration have been reported, including back pain, sciatica, gastrointestinal problems, genital problems and hearing impairment. In the present research, vibration was measured about 2000 minutes in 23 train of 4 active lines of Tehran metro in order to determine the rate of subway drivers’ exposed to whole body vibration.
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Material and Method: Vibration meter and SVAN 958 analyzer, made by Svantek company, were utilized for measuring the whole body vibration. The level of weighted r.m.s acceleration for each axis, the combination of axes, peak factor, VDV and other common exiting ratios in the standard were measured and calculated according to ISO 2631-1.
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Result: Findings showed that according to Basic method drivers exposure to vibration is less than the lowest value of health guide critical region (<0.45m/s2). However, based on Vibration Dose Valuation (VDV), the exposure of 12 cases were higher than the lowest value (<8.5 m/s1.75) and only 11 cases were lower than the mentioned amount.
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Conclusion: Investigation of the result obtained from Basic method and VDV method manifested different amounts of vibration exposure in a way that VDV predicts higher level of risk, compared to basic method. The results shows that some presented indicators can not presented the safe zone in human vibration evaluations.

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Introduction: Road accidents are of the most important events, which cause death and injury of a large number of people and impose huge economic losses. According to previous studies, human factors are the main cause of traffic accidents. The purpose of this study was to investigate the role of behavioral factors in driving-related non-fatal accidents.

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Material and Method: The present analytical study was carried out among 150 drivers of urban and suburban transportation system in Yazd province. The research tool was Driver Behavior Questionnaire (DBQ) which is consisted of two sections: demographic information and driving behavior.

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Result: 83/9 % of the participants reported to use safety belt nearly always. The highest deliberate violations, slips, and mistakes were belonged to drivers with age group of 18-25. Moreover, deliberate violations had a significant relationship with rage (P < 0.05). Survey of behavioral factors in terms of vehicle ownership type showed that “deliberate violations” and “slips and mistakes” high among personal bus drivers and state-owned bus drivers, respectively, which shows the significant association between these behavioral factors and ownership type. What is more, rates of deliberate and unintentional violations and slips were higher among those with a history of two times incidents (P < 0.004).

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Conclusion: The results revealed that behavioral factors such as age, type of vehicle ownership, and accident history played a significant role in occurrence of traffic accidents.

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Introduction: Limited studies have been done to evaluate the whole-body vibration (WBV) exposure experienced by Taxi drivers. Therefore, the aim of this study was to evaluate the exposure to whole body vibration and repeated shocks in urban taxi drivers and also to compare different methods of evaluation in this job environment.

Material and Method: Measurement and evaluation process were conducted in accordance with procedure of the ISO 2631-1 and ISO 2631-5 standards. The measurements were done by SVAN 958 Sound and Vibration Analyzer and using tri-axial accelerometer centered on the contact surface between the seat and the driver in 9 taxis.  

Result: The measurements done according to ISO 2631-1 method showed greater risk compared to Daily Equivalent Static Compression Dose, Sed, presented in ISO 2631-5. Calculated daily exposure durations for exposure action level in root-mean square, vibration dose value, and daily equivalent static compressive stress methods were 4.55, 3.54 and 31.70 hours, respectively.

Conclusion: The large differences in estimated exposure durations of action limits and permissible limits resulted by different methods reflect the inconsistency of the selected evaluation methods. Therefore, future research is necessary to amend the limits presented in the standard.

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Introduction: Examining the effect of bus drivers’ demographic characteristics as well as workplace conditions on their traffic behavior and performance is important not only for drivers’ health and safety, but also for the safety of bus passengers. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between demographic variables and work shift schedule on the behaviors pertaining to “hazard monitoring”, “relax driving”, “fatigue proneness”, and “thrill seeking” among intercity bus drivers.

Material and Method: In this cross-sectional study a sample of 321 bus drivers were randomly selected from Tehran intercity bus terminals. The BDRI questionnaire was used to collect data. The Pearson’s correlation coefficient and the ANOVA and Tukey’s HSD tests were used to analyze the data.

Result: In general, the findings showed that age, driving experience and rest time period positively correlate to lower fatigue, lower thrill seeking and more relaxed driving. Drivers with higher vehicle age were found to perform worse than others in hazard monitoring and to be more prone to the stress and fatigue. Also, fatigue and relaxed driving were significantly related to the marital status and cigarette usage. In addition, drivers who were college graduate or above were found to perform worse than other drivers considering all of the four factors. Furthermore, those who drive in mountainous routes were found to perform worse than other drivers in hazard monitoring and fatigue proneness.

Conclusion: Since the age and driving experience were found to influence fatigue proneness, hazard monitoring and relaxed driving, thus, setting up specific training courses for different driver age groups aiming to enhance their awareness concerning on managing these factors might help drivers improve their performance in these factors. Furthermore, regarding the effect of rest period and route type on the drivers’ fatigue and hazard monitoring ability, appropriate regulations are needed to mitigate the effect of these factors on the performance of drivers.

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Introduction: Work-related musculoskeletal disorders (WMSDs) are any disorders or injuries to the musculoskeletal system due to working procedure or conditions. WMSDs is one of the main causes of occupational injuries and disability in advanced and developing countries. The present study was conducted to evaluate the prevalence of musculoskeletal disorders in drivers in order to achieve complete results with high statistical power, using meta-analysis method.  
Material and Methods: This study is a systematic review and meta-analysis. In this study, the articles extracted from national and international databases, including Scientific Information Database (SID), Science Direct, PubMed (using the word MESH), Pre Quest, Scopus, Google Scholar, Iran Medix, SID, and MedLib. The main keywords for the search were Prevalence، Musculoskeletal and Drivers. The time for selecting articles was from 2000 to 2017. Data were analyzed using meta-analysis (random effect model). I2 and Q indexes were used to calculate heterogeneity. All statistical analysis was performed using STATA 14 software.
Results: In this study, 22 articles were entered into the meta-analysis process. The sample size was 7706 people with mean of 350 people in each study. The prevalence of musculoskeletal disorders in different organs of drivers was as follows: 26.19% (CI: 38-14.30), 18.07% (CI: 25.99-10.16), and 5.75% (CI: 8.27-3.22) in neck, shoulder, wrist / hand, and elbow respectively. The highest prevalence was related to low back pain 41.63% (confindence Interval (CI): 33.09-50.17), and the lowest prevalence was related to elbow disorder 7.45% with (CI: 95.46-9.43).  The significance level was set at 0.05.
Conclusion: The results of this study show that the prevalence of pains in the back, neck, and shoulder are high among drivers. Also, due to the high prevalence of predicting the incidence of impaired driving. in order to control and reduce these disorders, appropriate design of seats and equipment of vehicles, conducting periodic examinations of drivers,performing proper exercise, and considering adequate rest time in working hours are recommended. Ergonomics and occupational health education programs are also recommended to reduce the risk of developing musculoskeletal disorders associated with driving.

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Introduction: Safety is a significant part of the public transportation. Suitable safety climate has a positive effect on safety performance and reduces accidents rate. The aim of this study was investigating safety climate status of Tehran subway drivers in 2013.
Material and method:  The present study was a descriptive and cross-sectional study. In this study, statistical population was all drivers of 1, 2 and 4 lines of Tehran Urban & Suburban Railway Operation company. Also, a questionnaire arranged by one of our researcher was used to collect demographics data of subjects. Safety climate was also investigated using standard Vinod Kumar's questionnaire. Data were analyzed by descriptive statistics and T-Student and ANOVA tests using SPSS21 software.
Results: Overall, 293 questionnaires were analyzed. Among the participants, 38.8% were line 1 derivers, 31.1% line 2 drivers and 33.1% line 4 drivers. The mean and standard deviation of the safety climate was 146.53±49.44, which is less than 147 (median). The results indicated that safety climate had a relation with the age group and education levels (P<0.01), while had no significant relationship with the deriving experience, and also marital status (P>0.05).
Conclusion: Safety climate status among subway drivers is not desirable. Among the various factors, commitment and performance of management in the safety area had the weakest status. Strengthening the structure of the health, Safety and Environment (HSE) management system in the Tehran Urban and Suburban Railway Operation company can enhance the level of safety climate among staff of this organization.

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Introduction: Despite the numerous studies on occupational noise-induced hearing loss, there is limited documentation on the vibration effects on the workers’ auditory system. Heavy equipment drivers are exposed to high levels of whole-body vibration (WBV) and noise. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the heavy equipment drivers’ auditory response to WBV exposure and combined exposure to noise and WBV.
Material and Methods: 30 male heavy equipment drivers with an average age of 32.40 ± 4.91 years participated in this study, which was designed based on the repeated measurements model. During 3 defined scenarios of exposure to WBV, combined exposure to noise and WBV, as well as the scenario without exposure, the drivers’ auditory response was measured using distortion product otoacoustic emissions (DPOAE). Statistical analyses were performed by IBM SPSS-25 software.
Results: The range of heavy equipment in-cabin noise was 84-89 dB. Also, the most exposure of drivers to WBV was obtained in the Z axis with an average acceleration of 1.29 m/s2. The DPOAE amplitude of the drivers in all three investigated scenarios showed significant changes (P<0.05); But in comparison between different scenarios, exposure to WBV and combined exposure to noise and WBV had a significant effect on the response of the auditory system of the participants in the study compared to the scenario without exposure (P<0.05). Also, there was a significant difference in the changes of the DPOAE amplitude in different frequencies; Thus, the most changes in the DPOAE amplitude were observed in the frequencies of around 4000 Hz.
Conclusion: The results of this study showed the damaging consequences of exposure to noise and WBV on the auditory response; In addition, the present study provided evidence of synergistic effects of combined exposure to noise and WBV on heavy equipment drivers.
 

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Introduction: Despite advancements in road safety and vehicle design, road accidents remain prevalent, a quarter of which are caused by driver distraction. This issue is particularly critical in the public transport sector, especially among urban bus drivers, as distraction can lead to serious injuries and fatalities. Accordingly, this study explored the factors influencing distraction among urban bus drivers through a qualitative approach and a macroergonomics perspective.
Material and Methods: In this study conducted in 2024 in Tehran, 18 urban bus drivers were selected through cluster sampling. The participants included 10 drivers from bus rapid transit (BRT) system and 8 drivers from non-BRT services. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews with the drivers as well as on-site observations. Subsequently, a directed qualitative content analysis approach, based on the balance theory model, was used to analyze the collected data.
Results: The findings revealed that the primary sources of distraction belonged to six levels of the work system, the most cited of which were environment, tasks, and organization. Specifically, inappropriate behavior of other street users as an environmental factor and the driver’s interactions with passengers as task-related factors were identified as key sources. Additionally, organizational factors such as interactions with supervisors and colleagues, as well as salary issues, were significantly important. The participants very limitedly expressed using mobile phone while driving as a main distractor to their driving.
Conclusion: The current study identified various influential factors, spanning different levels of the work system, affecting bus drivers’ distraction, including generic factors that impact all urban drivers and specific factors that uniquely affect bus drivers. Addressing these factors through providing appropriate education for both passengers and street users along with implementing management strategies in the organization to enhance intra-organizational relationships and organizational support can lead to the safety of the bus drivers.