Evaluating the Efficacy of an Educational Intervention on Childhood Work Safety Practices and Injury Risk for Children Living or Working on a Farm
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| Language: | English |
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The Ohio State University / OhioLINK
2020
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| Online Access: | http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1593531435104691 |
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English |
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Public Health |
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Public Health Asti, Lindsey Evaluating the Efficacy of an Educational Intervention on Childhood Work Safety Practices and Injury Risk for Children Living or Working on a Farm |
| author |
Asti, Lindsey |
| author_facet |
Asti, Lindsey |
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Asti, Lindsey |
| title |
Evaluating the Efficacy of an Educational Intervention on Childhood Work Safety Practices and Injury Risk for Children Living or Working on a Farm |
| title_short |
Evaluating the Efficacy of an Educational Intervention on Childhood Work Safety Practices and Injury Risk for Children Living or Working on a Farm |
| title_full |
Evaluating the Efficacy of an Educational Intervention on Childhood Work Safety Practices and Injury Risk for Children Living or Working on a Farm |
| title_fullStr |
Evaluating the Efficacy of an Educational Intervention on Childhood Work Safety Practices and Injury Risk for Children Living or Working on a Farm |
| title_full_unstemmed |
Evaluating the Efficacy of an Educational Intervention on Childhood Work Safety Practices and Injury Risk for Children Living or Working on a Farm |
| title_sort |
evaluating the efficacy of an educational intervention on childhood work safety practices and injury risk for children living or working on a farm |
| publisher |
The Ohio State University / OhioLINK |
| publishDate |
2020 |
| url |
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1593531435104691 |
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AT astilindsey evaluatingtheefficacyofaneducationalinterventiononchildhoodworksafetypracticesandinjuryriskforchildrenlivingorworkingonafarm |
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1719457559901896704 |
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ndltd-OhioLink-oai-etd.ohiolink.edu-osu15935314351046912021-08-03T07:15:32Z Evaluating the Efficacy of an Educational Intervention on Childhood Work Safety Practices and Injury Risk for Children Living or Working on a Farm Asti, Lindsey Public Health BackgroundThe agriculture industry is one of the most hazardous in the United States. What makes this industry unique is that children can live on, work on, or visit farms, which puts them at risk for injury. Children often work on farms to help parents economically and to gain valuable experience. Published in 1999, the North American Guidelines for Children’s Agricultural Tasks (NAGCAT) are a set of guidelines (including supervision requirements, age limits, and work safety behaviors) for parents to follow when assigning specific farm chores to their children. The purpose of this study was to use data collected by Wilkins and Heaney to determine whether gender and farm residence status impacted work safety behavior compliance. Additionally, the purpose of this study was to compare work safety practice compliance and injury rates after an educational intervention was administered to farm families.MethodsData for the present study came from a study conducted by Wilkins and Heaney in Ohio between 2004 and 2006 where children aged 9 to 17 years documented any of the 31 NAGCAT chores they worked, how long they worked each chore, if they performed any of the work safety behaviors, and any injuries they sustained during the ten-week study period. Parents also completed a questionnaire on their personal and farm demographics and risk perceptions regarding their child being injured. Children completed a questionnaire on their demographics and completed Intelligence Quotient and neuropsychological testing prior to the ten-week follow-up period. A total of 330 children (207 in the intervention group and 123 in the control group) were included in this analysis. The first paper investigated the work safety practice compliance longitudinal prevalence among children who worked with large animals and used two-sample Kolmogorov-Smirnov tests to compare the prevalence proportions between boys and girls. The second and third papers investigated the impact of the educational intervention, which was administered to farm families after a median 25 days into the study. Data collected before the intervention date were excluded for the intervention group and data before 25 days were excluded for the control group. The second paper used two-sample Kolmogorov-Smirnov tests to compare the work safety practice compliance longitudinal prevalence proportions between the intervention and control groups among boys and girls for the four most commonly worked chores (worked with large animals, led or groomed animals, cleaned service alleys, and fed corn or silage to cattle). The third paper constructed multivariable count regression models to compare the injury rates between the intervention and control groups while taking exposure time into account for the four chores with the highest number of injuries (worked with large animals, led or groomed animals, unloaded hay, and cleaned service alleys).ResultsWhen children worked with large animals, they complied with only one of the work safety practices; checking for people and obstacles in the area. Boys, more specifically older boys, tended to exhibit higher compliance with the work safety behaviors compared to girls. When comparing farm resident status, there was only one statistically significant difference: younger farm resident girls reported higher compliance (95%) with checking for people and obstacles in the area compared to younger nonfarm resident girls (51%). Children in the intervention group did not significantly increase their work safety practice compliance compared to children in the control group for any of the work safety practices for the four most commonly worked chores. Additionally, children reported low compliance with most of the work safety practices, with the exception that boys reported relatively high compliance (over 67%) for wearing non-skid shoes while cleaning service alleys. Over 74% of boys and girls reported never wearing leather gloves and over 92% reported never using eye protection during the follow-up period for the four most commonly worked chores. Older boys in both the intervention and control groups reported higher compliance compared to younger boys.The educational intervention reduced the injury rate 77% [95% confidence interval (CI): 34%-92%] among children in the intervention group compared to the control group for children who led or groomed animals, but the intervention was not successful in reducing the injury rates for the three other chores. For children who worked with large animals, smaller farms (compared to farms with at least ten acres) and children with parents who took the need for an extra worker into account half the time when assigning farm chores to their children (compared to children with parents who took the need for an extra worker into account less than half the time) increased the injury rate. The injury rates for children with parents who took the need for an extra worker into account more than half the time was 0.68 times the injury rate for children with parents who took the need for an extra worker into account less than half the time (95% CI: 0.25-1.82). Among children unloading hay, girls had a 3.35 times higher injury rate than boys (95% CI: 1.14-9.82) and children with parents who had at least some college education had a 4.18 times higher injury rate than children with parents who did not have any college education (95% CI: 1.18-14.84). Additionally, for every unit increase in postural sway distance traveled, the injury risk increased 0.1% when comparing children who stood with their eyes closed to children who stood with their eyes open (95% CI: 0.03%-0.2%).ConclusionsThe current study indicates that boys and girls had different work safety practice longitudinal prevalence proportions when working with large animals, children generally had low work safety practice compliance, and that the educational intervention was not successful in increasing the work safety practice compliance nor in decreasing the injury rates, except it did reduce the injury rates by 77% for children who led or groomed animals. This study adds to the limited NAGCAT, work practice compliance, and childhood agricultural injury literature. Additionally, this study indicates the need for more chore-specific study designs and interventions. 2020 English text The Ohio State University / OhioLINK http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1593531435104691 http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1593531435104691 unrestricted This thesis or dissertation is protected by copyright: all rights reserved. It may not be copied or redistributed beyond the terms of applicable copyright laws. |