Evaluating Workplace Injury And Illness Records; Testing a

A pilot project to test the feasibility of a case-by-case comparison of the employer's Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) record-keeping log with medical records, workers compensation reports, and other related material was initiated as a method for evaluating the quality of OSHA data and improving these data where necessary. OSHA inspectors visited 200 manufacturing establishments in Massachusetts and Missouri to interview the record keepers, reconstruct the OSHA log, and interview employees. Of the establishments visited, OSHA reviewers found overrecording in 15% of nearly 4,000 cases on their logs for 1986, and underrecording in about 1/5 of the total recordable cases. The employee interview was initiated to: 1. test a method for obtaining information from employees concerning their awareness of the recording process, and 2. learn if employees knew of any cases that should have been on the log but had not been recorded. One major objective of the test was achieved in that reviewers were able to access the medical records to permit an evaluation of the logs. The secondary objective was to determine the cost resource of carrying out the plan.