Injury at work and migrant workers: a priority for a global agenda in occupational health

Ahonen, Emily Q.; Benavides, Fernando G.

doi:10.1136/oemed-2016-103964

Cited by 10 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 11 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The study of the mechanisms that explain the differential health of immigrant workers has been identified as a priority for research, and this issue is indicated as a priority for a global agenda in occupational health [36, 37]. The Whip-Salute database allowed us to analyse high quality data in great detail.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Differences in work injury risk between immigrants and natives: changes since the economic recession in Italy

et al. 2019

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Background It is known that occupational injury rates are higher for immigrant than for native workers, however the effects of the economic cycles on these differences has not been assessed to date. The aim of the paper is to test if the crisis has the same mechanism of selection in the two groups by comparing injury rates in 2005 (before the crisis) and in 2010 (after the crisis). Methods The Work History Italian Panel-Salute integrated database was interrogated to identify employment contracts in the metalworking and construction industries for the years 2005 and 2010 and the occupational injuries. A definition based on the type of injury, less likely to be biased by underreporting, was used to select serious events. Immigrants and natives were matched using the propensity score method and injury rates were calculated in the two years. Analyses were stratified by industry. Results In the metalworking industry injury rates slightly increased over time for both groups, and were higher among immigrant than native workers in both 2005 and 2010. In the construction industry the 2005 injury rate was the same in the two groups, and there was a negative trend over time in both groups. However the decline in the 2010 injury rate for Italian workers was much larger, which led to a considerable increase of the incidence rate ratio of immigrants with respect to native (IRR 3.83, 95% CI 2.52–5.75). Conclusions The economic recession had an impact on the risk of workplace injury. Though the main observed factors (18 variables) usually reported in literature to explain the higher injury rates of the immigrant workers were controlled through the matching, there were still differences between immigrants and natives. The main reason is that immigrants continue to be assigned to the more dangerous jobs and the more dangerous tasks within these job. Furthermore, also differences in the perception of workplace injury risks, linguistic barriers, and cultural factors may have a role in explaining this gap. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1186/s12889-019-7178-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Differences in work injury risk between immigrants and natives: changes since the economic recession in Italy

et al. 2019

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…PE is unevenly distributed among workers, intersecting with other categories of socially created vulnerabilities linked to race, gender, age, income, class, citizenship, and disability ( Muntaner et al., 2020 , I.-H. Kim et al., 2008 , Borrell et al., 2004 ), which means that certain groups of workers have higher risks of developing unfavorable outcomes related to their employment. In addition, given that migration status is tied to additional disadvantages for migrant workers ( Baron et al., 2014 , Lewchuk et al., 2018 , Ahonen and Benavides, 2016 ), the PE conditions experienced by non-migrant HCWs, can be further exacerbated for migrant HCWs. For instance, given that licenced health professionals must have their credentials accepted by the host country before being allowed to practice their profession, the process can be long and filled with barriers and, during this time, they have little choice but accept any work that allows them to survive ( Covell et al., 2016 , Khan-Gökkaya et al., 2019 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Health care workers and migrant health: Pre- and post-COVID-19 considerations for reviewing and expanding the research agenda

Gunn

Somani

Muntaner

2021

Journal of Migration and Health

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The main purpose of this article is to review several ways in which health care workers could either impact migrant health or be directly impacted by migration and, based on this, suggest the expansion of the current research agenda on migration and health to address a range of topics that are currently either neglected, insufficiently researched, or researched from different perspectives. To ground this suggestion and emphasize the complexity and significance of migrant health research, we start by briefly reviewing several migration-related notions including the process of migration and its key facilitators and benefits; existing barriers to the provision of migrant health care; and the intricate links between health systems, health professionals, and migrant health. The three areas of research examined in this article address (i) the specific role of health workers in providing care to migrants and refugees and their capacity to do so, (ii) the health problems experienced by health workers who become migrants or refugees, and (iii) the precarious employment conditions experienced by both migrant and non-migrant health care workers. After summarizing the current available evidence on these topics, we discuss key information gaps and strategies to address them, while also incorporating several relevant COVID-19 pandemic considerations and research implications. Expanding the focus of research studies on migration and health could not only enhance the results of current strategies by supplying additional information to support their implementation but also spearhead the development of new solutions to the migrant health problem.

show abstract

“…Research on immigrant and migrant workers’ health has grown over the past decade, along with a recognition of their elevated rates of occupational injuries and illnesses and difficulties accessing care, compensation, and rehabilitation . While these inequalities are not new, the social and scientific discourse surrounding their underlying causes has changed over time.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Discourse on culture in research on immigrant and migrant workers’ health

Premji

2019

American J Industrial Med

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Background Health and safety researchers and practitioners have proposed that cultural differences help explain inequalities between foreign and native‐born workers. While cultural explanations for inequalities have long been debated in other fields, there exists little critique of cultural discourses in occupational health. Methods This article examines and discusses the discourse on culture in 107 articles on immigrant or migrant workers’ health published between 2011 and 2015. For each article, passages on culture were identified and analysed for both the context and the manner in which culture was discussed. Results The discourse on culture was found to be generally simplistic, individualistic, and uncritical, intentionally or unintentionally supporting the worldview that workers’ “otherness” is both cause of inequalities and target for interventions. Conclusion The article argues that empirical, theoretical and interdisciplinary work is needed to document the mechanisms and pathways that underlie health and safety inequalities by foreign‐born status.

show abstract

Injury at work and migrant workers: a priority for a global agenda in occupational health

Cited by 10 publications

References 11 publications

Differences in work injury risk between immigrants and natives: changes since the economic recession in Italy

Differences in work injury risk between immigrants and natives: changes since the economic recession in Italy

Health care workers and migrant health: Pre- and post-COVID-19 considerations for reviewing and expanding the research agenda

Discourse on culture in research on immigrant and migrant workers’ health

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About