Abstract
Objective
We examined whether low literacy skills are a risk factor for occupational injury during a 5.3-year follow-up period.
Methods
The study population was taken from the Danish participants in the Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) in 2011/2012. Literacy skills were based on the PIAAC survey. Data on occupational injuries were obtained from national registers. We included the 5997 employees aged 16–65 who worked during the follow-up period. We used Cox regression to estimate the risk of occupational injury as a function of literacy skills. We adjusted the analysis for gender, age, nationality at birth, educational level, occupation, weekly work hours and month of survey completion.
Results
Literacy skills were divided into four categories based on the six levels of skills in PIAAC. With the highest level of literacy skills as the reference (level 4/5), the hazard ratios for occupational injury were estimated at 1.58 (95% CI 0.80–3.15) for literacy level 3, 2.04 (95% CI 0.99–4.19) for literacy level 2 and 2.29 (95% CI 1.08–4.86) for literacy level 0/1.
Conclusion
Employees with a low level of literacy skills are at a higher risk of occupational injury than employees with a high level of literacy skills.
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Availability of data and material
All data were stored and processed on a secure, protected server at Statistics Denmark. Access to data can be obtained by written application to gain approval from Statistics Denmark. Applications can be submitted by researchers who are affiliated with Danish institutions accepted by Statistics Denmark, or by researchers outside of Denmark who collaborate with researchers affiliated with these institutions.
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Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank the researchers of the Danish PIAAC group from VIVE—The Danish Center for Social Science Research Anders Rosdahl, Mona Larsen and Vibeke Jakobsen for valuable discussion of the PIAAC survey and data used in the analysis. Anders Rosdahl was responsible for the 1st cycle of PIAAC in Denmark (2011/2012) and Mona Larsen is responsible for the 2nd cycle of PIAAC (2022).The authors would also like to thank Helene Feveile from Statistic Denmark for valuable support and assistance with the statistical analysis.
Funding
The study was funded by the Danish foundation Helsefonden (grant number 20-B-0164). The funder has played no role in planning, execution or interpretation of the study or in the decision of publishing.
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Both authors contributed to the design of the study. JHP made the analysis and wrote the draft of the manuscript. Both authors contributed to and approved the final manuscript.
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The study complies with the General Data Protection Regulation and The Act on Processing of Personal Data (Act No. 502 of 23 May 2018). This Act supplements and implements Regulation (EU) 2016/679.
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Pejtersen, J.H., Holt, H. Literacy and risk of occupational injury. Int Arch Occup Environ Health 95, 1971–1978 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00420-022-01898-w
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00420-022-01898-w