Equipment Interventions to Improve Construction Industry Safety and Health: A Review of Case Studies

Abstract

A review was conducted of 153 case studies of construction equipment interventions, representing $6.55 million (2016 USD) of equipment purchases incentivized through the U.S. state of Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation (OBWC) Safety Intervention Grant (SIG) program. The source data were drawn from the applications and final reports of employers who received grants between 2003 and 2016. Outcomes were reductions in safety hazards, cumulative trauma disorder risk factors, and a score assessing quality of the intervention evaluative experience as determined through a framework developed by the authors. Items relating to the quality of the evaluative experience were manually extracted from the case study documentation. When aggregated by type of construction equipment, the risk factor reduction and evaluative quality scores were variable within and between equipment types. Equipment for cable pulling, used in the electrical trades, and skid steer attachments for concrete breaking (hydraulic breakers) both emerged as interventions ranked highly for reducing risk factors and for the evaluative quality of their case studies. Other intervention equipment types that ranked highly in both risk factor reduction and evaluative quality were concrete sawing equipment, trailers with hydraulic tilting/ramps, powered hand tools, and man lifts (boom lifts).