Académique Documents
Professionnel Documents
Culture Documents
Practitioner
Reading
March 2008
®
Contents
OVERVIEW .....................................................................................................................1
SECTION 1: INTRODUCTION.......................................................................................2
SUMMARY ....................................................................................................................19
Published by WorkSafe,
Department of Consumer and
Employment Protection,
PO Box 294, WEST PERTH WA 6872.
Tel: Toll Free 1300 307 877.
Email: institute@worksafe.wa.gov.au
Before using this publication, note should be taken of the Disclaimer, which is published at the
SafetyLine Institute website.
READING – GENERAL OSH INFORMATION SOURCES
OVERVIEW
This reading will give you an insight into the types of OSH
resources available and how these can be accessed.
Objectives
After reading this information you should be able to:
Authors
Section 1: INTRODUCTION
Glossary of terms
When they are first used, glossary terms are indicated with an
asterisk (*). Make sure that you are familiar with the Glossary of
terms before going any further.
The aim of this reading is to give an insight into the types of OSH
resources available and how these can be accessed. Hot links to
relevant sites are located in the References and Further Reading
section.
2.1 Legislation
Western Australia KEY POINT
National
• Australian Workplace Safety Standards Act 2005
• Australian Workplace Safety Standards Regulations 2005
International
• ILO conventions and recommendations
2.2 Standards
Standards referred to in the legislation are documents that set out
the minimum requirements for manufactured goods, processes or
procedures. The agencies responsible for setting standards in
Australia are Standards Australia, Australian Safety and
Compensation Council (ASCC) and the National Health and
Medical Research Council (NH&MRC). Examples of international
or other national standards setting bodies are the British Standards
Institute, and the International Standards Organisation. All
standards issued by these bodies can be purchased from their
local offices or their appointed agents. These organisations also
have home pages on the Internet with links to their catalogues and
information on how to place orders online. In the WorkSafe WA
Library we subscribe to Australian Standards online and have
some hard copies in our collection.
National Standards
Standards Australia can be located on the Internet at:
www.standards.com.au
International Standards
For international standards and their Internet sites go to:
National (Australia)
• Safe use of ethylene oxide in sterilisation/fumigation processes
[NOHSC:2008 (1992)]
• Preparation of material safety data sheets
[NOHSC:2011(2003)]
National codes of practice are no longer available as hard copies
but can be downloaded from the internet. All Western Australian
codes and some of the national publications are available on the
WorkSafe website at www.docep.wa.gov.au/worksafe. All national
publications can be found at www.ascc.gov.au
International (HSE)
• Control of lead at work
• Managing health & safety in construction
International (ILO)
• Safe construction and operation of tractors
• Prevention of major industrial accidents
National (Australia)
• Guidance note for the prevention of occupational overuse
syndrome in keyboard employment [NOHSC : 3005 (1996)]
• Guidance note for the assessment of health risks arising from
hazardous substances in the workplace [NOHSC: 3017 (1994)]
International (HSE)
• Managing shift work: Health and safety guidance
• Assessing and managing risks at work from skin exposure to
chemical agents – guidance for employers and health and
safety specialists
Encyclopaedias
(Reference work containing articles on various topics arranged
alphabetically)
Glossary
(An alphabetical list with information of technical terms in some
specialised field of knowledge)
Dictionaries
(A reference book containing an alphabetical list of words with
information about them)
Handbooks
(A book that gives advice and instructions about a particular
subject)
Textbooks
(A book used by students as a standard work for a particular
branch of study)
Occupational Medicine
• Lecture notes on occupational medicine.
Waldron, H.A. (1985), 3rd. Ed. Blackwell
Scientific, Oxford.
• Occupational Medicine. Zenz, C.;
Dickerson, O. Bruce; Horvath, Jr., Edward
P. (eds.) (1994) 3rd ed. Mosby, St. Louis,
Mo.
• A practical approach to occupational and
environmental medicine. McCunney, Robert
J. (Ed.) (1994) 2nd ed. Little, Brown & Co., Boston.
• Occupational health practice. Waldron, H.A. (1989) 3rd ed.
Butterworths, London.
• Practical occupational medicine. Agius, Raymond M. and
Seaton, Anthony (2006) 2nd ed. Hodder Arnold, London
Ergonomics
• Fitting the task to the human. Grandjean,
E., Kroemer, K.H.E (1997). 5th ed. Taylor &
Francis, London.
• A guide to manual materials handling. Mital,
A., Nicholson, A.S., Ayoub, M.M. (1997). 2nd
ed. Taylor & Francis, London.
• Bodyspace: anthropometry, ergonomics
and design. Pheasant, Stephen (1996) 2nd
ed. Taylor & Francis, London.
Industrial Hygiene
• Fundamentals of industrial hygiene. Plog, Barbara A.; Quinlan,
Patricia J. (2002) 5th ed. National Safety Council, USA.
• Air monitoring for toxic exposures: an integrated approach.
Ness, Shirley A. (1991) Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York.
• Industrial hygiene evaluation methods. Bisesi, Michael S. and
Kohn, James P. (1995) Lewis Publishers, Florida.
Noise
• Criteria for a recommended standard: occupational noise
exposure, revised criteria 1998. NIOSH (USA) (1998).
USDHHS, Cincinnati Ohio.
• Noise induced hearing loss: basic mechanisms, prevention and
control. Henderson, Don; et al. (2001). NRN Publications,
London.
• Occupational hearing loss. Sataloff, Robert Thayer and
Sataloff,Joseph (2006). 3rd ed. Taylor and Francis, Boca Ratan,
Fla.
• Occupational noise. National standard [NOHSC : 1007(2000)].
National code of practice [NOHSC : 2009 (2004)]. National
Occupational Health and Safety Commission. (2004). 3rd ed.
NOHSC, Canberra, Australia.
• Noise management at work. National Occupational Health and
Safety Commission. (1991). AGPS, Canberra, Australia.
• Handbook of noise induced hearing loss: prevention and
rehabilitation. Barber, Antony (1992). AGPS, Canberra,
Australia.
3.3 Periodicals
Journals are a very good source of up-to-date information because
of the frequency of publication. Information in books takes time to
be written and published whilst journal articles report on more
current issues. Journals also contain useful information in the form
of book reviews, news items and announcements of conferences
and seminars. A number of the international journals are now also
available on-line on the Internet. Journals can either be
State
• Safetyline Magazine - A practical guide to occupational safety
and health published by WorkSafe Western Australia.
(Publication of this has now ceased)
National
• National Safety - Official occupational safety and health journal
of the National Safety Council of Australia. This journal reports
on current issues on safety and health and also carries a lot of
advertisements on safety products, videos, training courses
and other news items.
International
• Health and Safety at Work - U.K. publication very similar to the
Australian Safety News. It is more of a trade journal carrying a
number of advertisements, OSH news in brief and one or two
feature articles.
• Journal of Occupational & Environmental Hygiene - "a
publication for the science of occupational and environmental
health" with special focus on all aspects of industrial hygiene
practice, policy and procedures.
• Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine - the
official journal of the American College of Occupational and
Environmental Medicine. This was formerly known as the
Journal of Occupational Medicine. It presents articles on
occupational and environmental health practice.
3.4 Newsletters
Newsletters are the best sources of up-to-date information about
recent developments in a particular field. Most newsletters report
on current research, new work programs or work practices and
include short articles on topical issues.
Australian Newsletters
• Occupational Health News - a national newsletter on work
health and safety published by Thomson Legal & Regulatory
Ltd.
• OHS bulletin - a guide to workplace health and safety
published Crown Content Pty. Ltd. Includes, in brief, OSH
news around Australia and reports on case studies.
International Newsletters
• Health and safety newsletter - published by HSE, U.K.
• Canadian occupational health & safety news - published by
Business Information Group.
There are many safety videos available for education and training
purposes. The WorkSafe WA Library has a collection of more
than 350 videos and DVDs that are available for use by industry
at large. There are videos and DVDs on topics like accident
investigation, construction industry, ergonomics, back care and
other relevant subjects. There is a comprehensive catalogue and
this can be accessed on the Internet at
http://www.docep.wa.gov.au/worksafe. Examples of titles
available from the Library are:
OSH-ROM Online
This is an international database for literature searches in the
occupational safety and health field. It is very comprehensive with
more than 1.5 million citations taken from more than 5,000 journals
and over a 100,000 monographs and technical reports. There are
several databases in this service but the four important ones are:
4.3 Internet
The Internet now provides a KEY POINT
number of sites where OSH
Safety officers who want to
information can be accessed. be kept up-to-date with the
This has become a useful tool latest developments in
for obtaining information quickly occupational safety and
health would read journals
and at a low cost. and newsletters, use the
WorkSafe WA has a homepage Internet and follow
on the Internet that has newsgroups.
comprehensive information on occupational safety and health.
WorkSafe also provides links to other sites such as the Health and
Safety Executive in the UK, the Canadian Centre for Occupational
www.ccohs.ca/resources/listserv.htm
SUMMARY
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Further information is available at: