The Advantage Survey for Construction Accidents Knowledge Platform Built

Transcription

1 Commentary The Advantage Survey for Construction Accidents Knowledge Platform Built Ching-Wu Cheng 2 Chen-Chung Lin 1 Sou-Sen Leu 3 Chia-Chun Yu 1 Wei-Fan Chen 2 1 Institute of Occupational Safety And Health, Council of Labor Affairs, Executive Yuan 2 Department of Safety Health and Environmental Engineering, 3 Department of Construction Engineering, National Taiwan University of Science and Technology Abstract For the past few years, most of the labor accident investigation in Taiwan is analyzed by using the historical labor accident data. However, along with the continuous accumulating database, related research result cannot provide more detailed distributions and patters of labor accident for the internal and external user community. Furthermore, the knowledge sharing of labor accident database depends on the result of effective analysis and also the establishment of network platform to provide a real-time assistance to every user in the construction safety field. This research adopted the occupational accident data from year 2000 to 2008 (1437 cases) to explore the potential cause-and-effect relationships and the significant factors related to the occupational accidents in the construction industry. In this study, through the Internet-based system to develop a knowledge platform to help internal and external communities for their acquisition of statistical results and potential hidden rules behind construction accident data. This value-added information will effectively assist project safety managers in the promotion of safety prevention actions. Keywords: Construction industry, Occupational accidents, Knowledge sharing platform Accepted 29 September, 2010 Correspondence to : Ching-Wu Cheng, Mingchi University of Technology, cwcheng@mail.mcut.edu.tw 58

2 The Advantage Survey for Construction Accidents Knowledge Platform Built Preface The cause and state distribution of construction accidents may be complicated and varied due to the different construction characteristics and operating environments, and the different safety awareness states of employers, contractors, and workers. In the various impact factors, how we apply the information technology (IT) (such as: internet, etc. knowledge transferring and sharing functions) to systematically organize the distribution result of the domestic major construction accidents between 2000 and 2008, and present the results will be further shown in the research. The research used the nature of domestic construction accidents and the possible occurrence state of construction accidents to process system analysis and design through IT. At the same time, with the establishment of a major occupational accidents knowledge platform, the related statistical method and system program are applied and written to establish occupational accident classification, casual relationship and potential trend expectations [1-3]. The safety management technology is also combined to summarize an occupational accident state knowledge base. The Internet technology is applied to further implement this knowledge in the construction safety management operation, and achieve the goal of the government in reducing occupational accidents. The knowledge value of labor safety is to go through organizing the accumulated experiences, including technological documents, research reports, and occupational accident survey results, to provide the distribution state or concentration trend between the research analysis result and the information through statistical technology and data retrieval functions. The system program will be designed to provide the visual function in the user s operating interface, and the analysis result will be presented in charts for users to grasp the overall picture of the even in real-time, and further apply it as the reference for safety management items and focus. The research focus mainly based on major construction accidents database to explore the users demands on the accident prevention or safety management focus provided by the occupational accident data distribution. It combined with the statistical module to provide the analysis result of occupational accident data, developed a network knowledge system, applied On-Line Analytical Processing (OLAP) to design the retrieval function program of users demands, and presented the occupational accident knowledge transmission in multi dimensions. In addition, focusing on the current constructions managed by various labor inspection offices, the major occupational accident result distribution or trend state from the employers, business units and accident units can be compared to recognize the potential accident operation features and construction conditions, and further assist managers to effectively grasp the casual relationship of accident occurrence. Data Process and Analysis Process The occurrence of occupational accidents often follows a certain pattern, and occupational safety management also should be focused on by every industry. According to the 2009 Labor Inspection Guideline [4] announced by the Council of Labor Affairs, the vision, goal and strategy mentioned in the guideline mainly focus on how 59

3 to effectively safeguard labor safety and health, and further go through the inspection system, cooperation model and education advocacy to reach the goal of No occupational accidents. However, looking at the process of promoting major domestic occupational accident information technology, it is found that the process still remains in general webpage browsing, or related documents and labor inspection annual report downloads. It is not easy to tell the overall trend development or the distribution of the connections between various impact factors of the occupational accidents. According to the Enforcement of R&D Innovation Implementation Guideline No promulgated by the Executive Yuan, various authorities shall use the authority mission to plan the future vision, set the authority goal, establish implementation strategy, and apply the knowledge management method to promote R&D innovation tasks [5,6]. At the same time, to cope with the e-taiwan program, Challenge 2008: National Development Plan, the ministries also applied the disaster prevention information platform, etc. knowledge base provided by the Internet. For example, the Council of Labor Affairs has established an accident prevention information network platform to provide videos, pictures, and text descriptions of related construction safety, electrical safety and safety health, etc. operation states [7] based on labor safety. The websites of the U.S.A., the U.K., Ireland, Canada, Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong and International Labor Organization (ILO) have provided similar Labor Safety and Health frameworks. They also still focus on presenting the historical data ( including research reports, reports and propaganda) of the information content. As the official infor- mation published still provides browsing by the general public and international people, the related information is also often presented in reports or simple charts. However, labor safety related research topics are still limited to primary data retrieval, and cannot provide users with the statistical charts presented according to situational demands. In various countries established occupational management platforms, the occupational accident situation information content established by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Japan ( is more consistent with the situational retrieval framework that the research wants to implement. The overseas safety information report provided by the platform includes: safety and health laws and regulations, safety relationship, health relationship, industry type information, and accident statistics. Conversely, the information is presented in a static chart post-process result, which does not fully show the distribution comparison between real-time and different data columns. The Situation of Reducing Domestic Construction Accidents According to the major occupational accident death rate in workplaces that applied to the Labor Safety and Health Act in the 2009 Labor Statistics Annual Report of the Council of Labor Affairs, Executive Yuan, it was found that the overall industry labor death rate and the construction industry death rate (excluding occupational disease and traffic accidents) have increased, shown as Figure 1. Moreover, in the labor inspection annual report, the Council of Labor Affairs, be- 60

4 The Advantage Survey for Construction Accidents Knowledge Platform Built tween 2000 and 2008, the major domestic construction accident amount was 1421 people deceased (including fatal traffic accidents), and 1043 people deceased (excluding fatal traffic accidents). The data showed that in the active promotion of the 223 accident reducing plan of the Council of Labor Affairs, the domestic occupational accident occurrence frequency has significantly reduced. In addition, to more specifically implementing a domestic occupational safety system and reducing accidents, Wang Ru-xuan, the Minister of the Council of Labor Affairs, emphasized that the certification system of Taiwan s occupational safety and health management system was activated in June 2008 to refer to international labor organization and international certification regulations, and promote occupational safety and healthy self-management. Its purpose also helps to achieve the accident reduction goal of the Council of Labor Affairs, which is to lower the overall occupational accident death rate to less than four in the coming four years [8]. In addition to the advocacy and counseling for high-risk workplaces, the related units will also implement project inspections, and for those who do not improve safety and health according to regulations, a fine and a suspension of operation will be issued, to further enhance the overall construction business units and various contractors construction safety standard and operating personnel s safety awareness. Figure 1 Fatalities per 1000 persons (construction industry, all industries and else), (Source: Yearbook of Labor Statistics, Taiwanese Council of Labor Affairs, 2009) 61

5 In addition, it can also be seen from the national occupational accident amount and national overall industry occupational accident trend that between 1999 and 2004, the overall industry occupational accident amount decreased significantly. However, from 2004 to 2006 and in 2008, the occupational accident amount increased from 319 people (in 2004) to 330 people (in 2008), it showed that the government still continued to work on domestic occupational accident management, shown as figure 2. It was found that the amount of injured people and disabled people have both increased when referring to the amount of major statistical construction accidents of the Labor Insurance Bureau between 2000 and Con- versely, the death rate decreased from (excluding fatal traffic accidents, in 2000) to (in 2007), and (in 2008), the results correspond with Figure 1. Establishment of a Construction Accident Knowledge Platform The internet knowledge platform established by the research is mainly divided into two parts:1) Occupational accident information links and knowledge analysis (including: domestic and foreign research reports, laws and regulations, propaganda media, occupational accident knowledge, and Figure 2 The major city and county occupational accident amount distribution between 1997 and 2008 (Source: The Council of Labor Affairs) 62

6 The Advantage Survey for Construction Accidents Knowledge Platform Built occupational accident cases). 2) Major domestic occupational accident information statistical distribution. The real-time statistical results of major occupational accidents are presented in bar charts and contingency tables through the situational design of considering different users demands, and the systematic analysis and logistic judgment on the selected cared occupational items, to allow Table 1 Users situational demand exploration Business subject High-rank mangers/ General public Business unit/ inspection section, and labor inspection office Research unit/institute of Occupational Safety and Health Situational demand Overall feature of occupational accident Annual trend 1. Consider the data of Labor Inspection Annual Report, Compare the existing occupational accident database, and explore the occupational accident rate distribution. 2. Present the yearly occupational accident amount in figures and charts according to the system statistics result. 3. Provided items: Industry type, employer type, construction type, region type, various cities and counties, occupational accident type, accident location, and the scale of the accident company of occurrence, etc.,year, month, date, and labor age, etc. overall statistical result Considered focus: Inspection focus, subject and the information of the general public. Retrieve or browse the message This demand provides the first stage (annual trend distribution) retrieval of various cities and counties or regions (such as the North Labor Inspection Office) through the data retrieval system. The inspection content is the same as the high-rank managers/ general public. The focus of situational consideration is to randomly select analysis sample according to the study purpose, such as: 1. Select and analyze according to the occupational accident type: Explore the falling down issue. 2. Select and analyze according to the construction type: The safety and health management state or occupational accident behavior of the construction. 3. Select and analyze according to the accident occurrence subject: The safety and health management ability of the accident occurrence company. 4. Select and analyze according to the according to the occupational accident subject: Labor age. 5. Select and analyze according to the occupational accident construction 63

7 users to grasp the overall occupational accident distribution state. 1. Users demand analysis and situation discussion System development will be different due to different users and establishment purposes. The users of the research are mainly competent authorities with business demands. The research at the same time, copes with the occupational accident database content established by the user, and process data retrieval operation depending on the cared about situational condition. It analyzes the result through system calculation, and presents it in figures or charts. The system considers humanity and visual demands, and the implementation process allows users to operate the contents they care about in steps through the interface menu, which helps to avoid the conditions from occurring when having the wrong logistic judgment. The users situational demands are shown as Table Major construction accidents database planning The major data collection source for domestic major occupational accident data is the labor inspection system established by the Council of Labor Affairs, Executive Yuan. The content is mainly designed and planned according to the response items of the workplace major occupational accident report and inspection handling outlines, and provided as the description for follow-up related statistics reports, such as: major occupational accident compiled charts, and labor inspection annual construction industry major occupational accident database Less then 1 person death More then 3 person injured Project ownership Level of construction job contracting Project distinction Construction contract amount Project type Direct factor and indirect factor Unsafe acts and unsafe condition Accident location Action state Work content Source of injury Time factor Major contractor safety tasks: Health and safety management work Health and safety personnel assigned Education and training implemented Health and safety autonomous inspection implemented Health and safety autonomous Health and safety rules determined Worker factor Accident type Injured part of body Violating laws and regulations Age; Gender; Worker type; Experience; Figure 3 The relationship between the major construction accident database attributes 64

8 The Advantage Survey for Construction Accidents Knowledge Platform Built wants to analyze through certain conditions. 3. The establishment of the Entity Relationship Model (ER-Model) The research applied the OLAP concept and referred to Japan s ( data retrieval concept to design the system program. OLAP processes data analysis in a multi-dimensional method, it provides Roll-up, Drill-down, and Pivot to present integrative decision-making information. It is mostly used in the decisionmaking support system; its major function is to apply a large amount of statistical data calculation to provide a reference and support to the decisionmaker. The distribution results between various selected variables can be obtained through past occupational accident occurrence states, and according to the implementation structure of OLAP, and a complete occupational accident database ER-Model can be established. However, as the current occupational accident database cannot comreports, etc. occupational accident data distribution results. The research data is mainly retrieved from the major occupational accident database (including deaths and injuries) listed by the Institute of Occupational Safety and Health between 2000 and 2008, which has a total of 1437 files. The database classification principle, in addition to referring to the accident classification regulations of the American National Standards Institute (ANSI,1995) Z [9], at the same time, also refers to the defined industry type of the Council of Labor Affairs, Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, DG- BAS, and the labor inspection offices. The connection result between the related occupational accident attributes is shown as Figure 3. The content of Figure 3 describes that the attributes of the occupational accident database can provide the importance result distribution of the occupational accident occurrence information, and after being integrated with the establishment of Entity Data Model, it can search the object and result the user Age Experience Gender Entering time Work content Project type Company scale Marital status Health status Insurance state Worker Labor-Participated construction contractor Labor-Participated construction contractor Health and safety management work Project distinction Marital status Injured state Occupation accident compensation Project distinction Project type Work content Work location Labor inspection unit Audit Construction contract amount Accident type Outsourcing unit Project region Source of injury Accident times Health and safety management work Project type Figure 4 The relationships of the occupational accident database E-R Model attributes 65

9 pletely include the occupational accident research issues, such as the construction environment, construction scale, construction operation content ( construction progress), construction type (structure type and area), contract type, accumulated construction working hours, and labor educational level, and the corresponding occupational accident records also cannot be obtained through the links of the occupational accident report or government information system. Therefore, the research used the related literature and expert interview comments to draw out the Entity Relationship Model structure, shown as Figure 4. provides the expansion and maintenance function and update for the database. Figure 5 is the framework of the construction knowledge platform established by the research. Through the output of the occupational accident database [10,11] and use the content that the users want to understand to select from the menu or condition, and then apply the statistical method to provide a digitalized analysis result to understand the past occupational accident distribution state, and further design safety prevention measures focusing on high-risk operation content or laborers with high accident features. 4. Knowledge platform establishment A complete knowledge platform retrieval function must also be able to provide horizontal and vertical inquiry and the knowledge sharing purpose [5,6]. It considers the establishment of the construction accident knowledge database, and 5. Knowledge management system website design and establishment The established system framework applies the content management system (CMS) of the APM framework as the overall construction of the research website and the presented platform. Bureau of Labor Insurance- Council of Labor Affairs Institute of Occupational Safety and Health Construction accident prevention center Internal and external community group Internal community Accident notifies Response/ Analysis KM platform Consultants Company Academic Units Construction Factory External community group Inspection Office Inspection Institutions Labor Inspection Unit Server planning and establishment Volume, speed, safety, and quality (visualization) Presenting content 1. Supplier safety assessment 2. Accident disposal plan 3. Information safety 4. Intellectual Property Rights 5. Search Occupational accident statistics Coordinated and discussion Inspection Annual occupational Office accident amount difference Labor Inspection Column Unit name and content internal and external community group Construction industry major occupational accident database Occupational accident casual relationship Manual, report, propaganda Search Figure 5 The framework of the construction accident knowledge platform 66

10 The Advantage Survey for Construction Accidents Knowledge Platform Built It applies Apache HTTP Server as the web server, PHP language to write the webpage program, and MySQL as the database to provide various layouts with static and dynamic data. The framework is shown as Figure 6. The operation environment is divided into three functions: general browsing, professional browsing, and advanced retrieval. In data dimensional design, it used the users situational browsing and retrieval purpose to consider the logistic concept presented by the planned layout implementation result, and meet the occupational accident database content established to unify the code design. At the same time, it considers the analysis purpose of the follow-up newly added data accumulated in the system, and during the system module establishment, it also designs the system established core as the presentation for providing related occupational accident descriptive statistic result charts. The occupational stati- stical module framework established in the research, are mainly in the situational mode of the general public, counties and cities and various districts, business units, and research personnel, etc. to assist the user to select the right parameter, and create the occupational accident statistical figure that meets the user s situation. For users who are research personnel, it designs the interaction interface with an easy and intuitive method to meet the situational demand. The research personnel situational mode provides a large amount of options for drawing the statistical figures, to allow researchers to fully apply the major construction accident database established by the study for researches. The statistics figure generator mainly provides the major figure component for system program development, and presents more occupational accident data dimensional results. Content Management System (CMS) Dynamic content General browse Professional browse Advanced browse Related links Occupational Accident report Commonly seen Violated laws and regulations Research report Occupational accident knowledge Propaganda media Occupational accident statistic core program Statistical figure component Static content Occupational accident database System registry The system is established with an Apache + MySQL + PHP operating environment Figure 6 System retrieval framework 67

11 Knowledge Platform Entity Operation State The design of the system s operating layout mainly uses visual components and icons instead of the transferring method. It is more user-friendly and easier to operate. Figure 7 is the homepage design. Figure 8 is the operating layout of various cities and counties sample selection and construction type analysis condition. To add value to the major construction accidents application during the research period, it goes through expert interviews and refers to competent government unit comments to set the situational retrieval of the KM platform into four levels for discussion; they are respectively the general public, counties and cities and various districts, business units, and research units. In addition, considering the occupational accident data resource difference, and the possible interpretation and cognition differences that may be caused by the statistical result, the research only applied the occu- Figure 7 Major construction accidents knowledge platform homepage Figure 8 Operating layout of various cities and counties sample selection and construction type analysis condition 68

12 The Advantage Survey for Construction Accidents Knowledge Platform Built pational accident database established from the undertaken research programs (IOSH96-S305, IOSH96-S306, IOSH97-315, IOSH98-S312) of the Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, Council of Labor Affairs, as the analysis matrix, and further presented the system analysis statistical result in figures and charts. The statistical data of the occupational accident amount, due to the different research purposes between the obtained data and the amount published by the Council of Labor Affairs, the analysis results are also different. The different result is not the focus of the research; it will be further discussed in the occupational accident data integration in the future. The research focus is to discuss the KM platform development technology and establishment effectiveness. The research core-major occupational accident statistical module will be described according to the The yearly distribution of all data Various accident types distribution of all data Figure 9 The situational mode scene for the general public 69

13 retrieval scene operation of different users: 1. The situational mode scene for the general public This processes the statistical figure drawing on the planned designed attributes of all data (no samples selected). In addition, it can also process statistical figure drawing according to the years ( shown as Figure 9). The X-axis items are year, month, week, hour, construction industry, construction type, accident type, region, source of injure, work content, contracting level, and age distribution. 2. Labor inspection unit- regions or city and county situational mode scene The related safety and health inspections are processed by the North, Central, South and various district inspection offices, Council of Labor Affairs, to manage the related construction accidents of Yearly distribution of Taipei City data Yearly distribution of Central Taiwan data Figure 10 The distribution statistics result of the yearly occupational accident amount according to regions or districts 70

14 The Advantage Survey for Construction Accidents Knowledge Platform Built various districts or counties and cities. The statistical figures are used according to the cared about content in the situational mode established by the system. The X-axis items are year, month, week, hour, construction industry, construction type, accident type, region, source of injure, work content, and age distribution, shown as Figure 10. Through the options on the right of the figure, the users can also process the statistical result analysis and figure presentation of individual occupational accident items according to the district overall sample or district annual sample. 3. The situational mode scene of construction business unit In the retrieval layout designs of the construction business unit, the major scene is similar to the labor inspection unit. Their major difference is that the menu subject of this mode applies construction type as the main sample, such as building The distribution of bridge construction data in various accident types The distribution of building construction data in various ages Figure 11 The situational mode scene of construction business unit 71

15 construction and road construction. The X-axis items are year, month, week, hour, construction industry, accident type, source of injure, work content, and age distribution, shown as Figure Research unit-institute of occupational safety and health occupational accident analysis situational mode scene In Figure 12, the research personnel situ- The distribution of public construction data of various occupation types The distribution of public construction data of various accident locations Figure 12 The situational mode scene of construction business units 72

16 The Advantage Survey for Construction Accidents Knowledge Platform Built ational mode can process statistics according to different sample types to select different samples, and the data numbers in the statistical figure are the statistical amount of various items. The X-axis item almost includes all database columns, including construction industry, construction type, construction distinction, accident type, counties and cities, region, year, month, week, hour, source of injury, accident location, contracting level, operation content, nationality, age, work experience, occupation type, unsafe condition, unsafe behavior, agreed upon work content, accident notification, and occurring accident company scale. The research personnel situational mode has a special function, which is the Z-axis data that can apply colors on the statistical figure; it is beneficial for the research analysis process. For the in-depth exploration on data meaning, Z-axis items also include most database columns: construction industry, construction distinction, region, source of injury, contracting level, work experience, unsafe condition, unsafe behavior, agreed upon work content, accident notification, and occurring accident company scale. In addition, considering research personnel may have more in-depth statistical analysis demands, the GRID button on the top-right corner of the figure can be selected, and create a data contingency table to facilitate in analyzing other statistical software or the drawings of other figures, shown as Figure 13. Conclusion and Recommendation A well planned knowledge platform, in a- ddition to the application value provided by the database content, also has users properly develop and apply the data source analysis result to present the true knowledge value. The knowledge platform established by the research, in addition to the connection or support of general knowledge, is mainly to construct the data of 1437 major construction accidents (2000~2008) as the core issue. In the research, after exploring the user demands, and considering the confidential conditions of information safety, different interface situational operation modes are designed to provide different community groups to use their authority to process overall or individual year related major construction accidents related data attribute distribution result inquiries. The functions provided by the system are different from the paper reports published by government units every year in knowledge promotion and distribution. The knowledge platform established by the research mainly applies the visualization method to establish domestic and foreign construction accident information connections. The information technology is introduced, and after the classification and coding of the occupational accident database, it applies program design to assist community groups to obtain the latest occupational accident information, which Figure 13 The statistical result of the occupational accident data contingency table distribution 73

17 is beneficial for promoting domestic construction accident prevention and accident reducing. However, the reunification of the occupational accident data source amount is related to the identification baseline of occupational accidents. How to unify the registry format, content name definition, and matrix source for calculating the accident rate of occupational accident cases requires the competent authority to further integrate the occupational accident database. Acknowledgement The research thanks the Institute of Occupational Safety and Health for providing the o- riginal major occupational accident report for the construction industry. The related research resource is supported by the research program (IOSH96- S305, IOSH96-S306, IOSH97-315, IOSH98-S312) of the Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, Council of Labor Affairs, which allows the research to be processed smoothly. Their assistance was highly appreciated. Reference [1] CC Lin and SS Leu. Accident Analysis and Safety Risk Management of Public Construction, Report of Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, Council of Labor Affairs, Executive Yuan, IOSH 96-S305. (Chinese) [2] CC Lin and CW Cheng. Data Mining of Construction Accidents in Architectural Engineering, Report of Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, Council of Labor Affairs, [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] Executive Yuan, IOSH 96-S306. (Chinese) CC Lin, SS Leu, CW Cheng and CC YU. Development of Knowledge Platform Based on Analysis of Construction Accidents, Report of Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, Council of Labor Affairs, Executive Yuan, IOSH 97-S315. (Chinese) Council of Labor Affairs, Executive Yuan (TW). Labor Inspection Policy. Taipei:The Insitute; (Chinese) CY Liu. The development of enterprise for Knowledge management. Kaohsiung (TW) NSYSU Departments of Business Management; paper/paper23.doc HH Wu. The Future and the past for Knowledge Management by Information Technology. Taipei (TW):Academia Sinica; (Chinese) 93/2012/03.txt Council of Labor Affairs, Executive Yuan (TW). Labor Inspection Policy. Taipei:The Insitute; (Chinese) center_news.asp?no3=35312 Lortie M, Rizzo P. The classification of accident data. Safety Science 1999; 31: Zhang, JH. Tacit Knowledge Management Strategies for Knowledge Management. Information Science 2006; 24 (5). LM Ding and JJ Chen. The development of Knowledge Management for MRT. MRT Technology Annual 2006;