Incidence of unintentional injuries in farming based on one year of weeklyregistration in Danish farms

Background In Denmark, farming ranks as the industry with the highest incid ence rare of fatal injuries. For nonfatal injuries, insufficient registrati on practices prevent valid comparisons between occupations. This study exam ines the occurrence of farm accidents and injuries, as well as work-specifi c factors, via weekly registration in a representative sample of 393 farms in one county during 1 year. Methods From a random sample of 794 farms, (10% of farms in the county of R ingkoebing, Denmark) 393 farms with 1,597 residents and employees participa ted in a 1-year self-registration of work-related unintentional incidents. The procedure included a detailed registration of hours spent on all main w orking tasks. Weekly recording of incident occurrence or nonoccurrence resu lted in the completion of 19,782 registration forms. Three months after inc ident occurrence, a telephone interview was conducted about the related wor k situation and resulting injuries. Results During the 12-month period, 479 occupational accidents,were reporte d of which 389 resulted in an injury. The absolute number of injuries incre ased with number of work hours, but there was no relative increase of incid ence by work hours. Persons below the age of 50 had slightly less than a do ubled risk compared with those over 50 years of age. No other marked, relia ble age effect was found. There was, however a seasonal variation, with sum mer and autumn having a double relative incidence compared with winter and spring. Among farm owners, 35% experienced at least one injury per year whi le this was the case for 17% of farm laborers. When adjusting for work hour s, the increase frequency of injuries among farm owners was reduced to a fa ctor of 1.5. Animal-related work was the most common injury mechanism. Repa ir and maintenance work was found to be the most dangerous task relative to the number of task-specific work hours. Subgroups of tasks M with a marked ly increased injury rate were moving animals within the farm, veterinary pr ocedures, and repair of field machinery and stable equipment. Conclusions Farm injuries occur among 32% of full-time farmers and farm lab orers each year. A quarter of these require professional treatment. This ar ea calls for preventive action. Am. J. Ind. Med. 38:82-89, 2000. (C) 2000 W iley-Liss, Inc.