Impact of participatory risk assessment approaches on occupational health professional's attitudes and practices

Introduction
In the last 10 years with the support of the Belgian Federal Public Service (FPS) for Employment and Labour and the European Social Fund, prevention advisors (PA) and occupational health physicians (OP) have been invited to use new methods for risk assessment involving workers’ participation, namely the Sobane strategy, or the Risk/Toxtrainer methodology. This study aimed at evaluating these methods actual use among PA’s and OP’s, and its impact on representations and risk management practices.

Methods
A national postal survey was conducted in 2007 among a random sample (n=3340) of all professionals registered as PA (>6000) or OP (about 1000) by the FPS. The questionnaire explored those professionals’ familiarity with 12 different risk assessments methods, the nature of their interventions in enterprises, their representations about participation and collected demographic information.

Results
A total of 859 completed surveys (response rate: 25.7 %) could be analyzed. Among the methods studied, the Kinney-Wiruth accident risk analysis is the most familiar (54% regular users + 19% trained ones). The participatory methods are familiar (users + trained) to respectively 46 % (Sobane) and 11% (Risktrainer) of the respondents. When analyzing practices in enterprises, the professionals familiar with one of the participatory approaches are more often than the other professionals suggesting the use of participation in risk management to colleagues (84 vs 67.5% ; p<0.000) or to the employer (84 vs 73.5% ; p<0.000). Those professionals not familiar with the participatory approaches agree more often with the following statements: “PA role is more to inform than to listen” (p=0.005), “Participatory processes are raising unrealistic expectations among the staff” (p=0.002).

Discussion
This study shows that participatory risk assessment methods are gaining ground in Belgian enterprises. It also highlights the significant influence that information and training in those methods have had on risk management practices and the professionals’ representations.