Occupational Health Literacy, Socioeconomic Status & Work-related Injury to Teens

描述（由申请人提供）：本研究考察了适用于工作场所的健康素养（即“职业健康素养”）与工伤之间的关系，工伤每年影响近23万名18岁以下的美国青少年。由于一般健康素养与各种健康结果和社会经济地位（SES）有关，因此职业健康素养可能与职业健康结果和社会经济地位有关，但尚未有研究探讨这一假设。在本研究中，我们将检验职业健康素养作为工伤（WRI）患病率的决定因素，以及作为SES与青少年WRI之间已知关联的中介因素。探索这一职业健康素养的新概念将为了解青少年工伤的原因以及青少年中SES与WRI之间的关系奠定新的基础。我们的具体目的是确定，1)低职业健康素养是否与青年中较高的工伤发生率相关，2)低社会经济地位的青年是否具有较低的职业健康素养，以及3)低社会经济地位青年中的低职业健康素养是否介导了低社会经济地位与工伤发生率升高之间的关联。我们将利用一个独特的数据集来实现这些目标，该数据集包含了美国五个城市2315名不同社会经济地位水平的青少年工作者的信息。这些数据包括与工作有关的伤害发生率、社会经济状况的若干措施以及用于衡量职业健康素养的一系列变量（例如，获得健康和安全信息的机会以及展示的健康和安全知识和技能）。这种数据组合是罕见的，并提供了一个很好的机会来回答本研究提出的研究问题。本研究中使用的主要分析技术将是回归模型。该样本中WRI的高患病率排除了逻辑回归的使用。因此，我们将使用Cox回归模型来获得患病率，就像之前研究WRI与SES之间的关系一样。这项研究解决了青年工人之间的创伤性伤害和职业健康差异，所有这些都是国家职业研究议程所强调的。研究结果将有助于制定干预措施，以提高工作青年的职业健康素养，并具体努力提高处境不利青年的素养，以减轻他们不成比例的伤害负担。公共卫生相关性：该项目调查了“职业健康素养”在青少年中作为工伤发生率的决定因素和社会经济地位与工伤之间关系的中介因素的作用。研究结果将为旨在减少青少年工伤发生率的预防工作提供信息。它们还可导致采取干预战略，使青年的职业健康知识普及程度平等，并作出具体努力，提高处境不利青年的职业健康知识普及程度，以减轻他们不成比例的伤害负担。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This study examines the relationship between health literacy as it applies to the workplace, i.e., "occupational health literacy," and work-related injury, which affects nearly 230,000 U.S. adolescents under 18 every year. Since general health literacy is known to be associated with a variety of health outcomes and with socioeconomic status (SES), occupational health literacy is likely to be related to occupational health outcomes and to SES as well, yet no studies have explored this hypothesis. In this study, we will examine occupational health literacy as both a determinant of work-related injury (WRI) prevalence and as a mediating factor in the known association between SES and adolescent WRI. Exploring this novel concept of occupational health literacy will forge new ground in understanding the causes of adolescent work injury and the association between SES and WRI among adolescents. Our specific aims are to determine, 1) if low occupational health literacy is associated with higher work-related injury prevalence among youth, 2) if youth of lower SES have lower occupational health literacy, and 3) if low occupational health literacy among low SES youth mediates the association between low SES and elevated work-related injury prevalence. We will achieve these aims by taking advantage of a unique dataset containing information on 2,315 adolescent workers of varying levels of SES in five cities across the US. These data include work-related injury prevalence, several measures of SES and an array of variables used to measure occupational health literacy (e.g., access to health and safety information and demonstrated health and safety knowledge and skills). This combination of data is rare and provides an excellent opportunity to answer the research questions posed in this study. The main analytic technique used in this study will be regression modeling. The high prevalence of WRI in this sample precludes the use of logistic regression. Therefore, Cox regression models will be used to obtain prevalence ratios as was done in the previous study of the association between WRI and SES. This study addresses traumatic injury and occupational health disparities among young workers, all of which are emphasized in the National Occupational Research Agenda. Study findings will be useful in developing interventions to enhance occupational health literacy among working youth, with specific efforts targeted at improving literacy among disadvantaged youth, to reduce their disproportionate injury burden. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: This project investigates the role of "occupational health literacy" as both a determinant of work-related injury prevalence and as a mediating factor in the association between socioeconomic status and work-related injury among adolescents. Study findings will inform prevention efforts aimed at reducing the prevalence of adolescent work-related injury. They can also lead to intervention strategies that equalize occupational health literacy among youth, with specific efforts targeted at improving occupational health literacy among disadvantaged youth to reduce their disproportionate injury burden.