Masculinity and Lifting Accidents among Danish Ambulance Personnel: Results from MARS – Men, Accidents, Risk and Safety

Background
Work injuries related to lifting are the most prevalent among ambulance personnel (AP) despite the introduction of ‘assistive technologies’ (AT) that help reduce situations of manual lifting. One third of the AP report using AT only ‘sometimes’ and 10% report having lifted a patient alone.

Aim
This presentation investigates whether failure to use AT is linked to male ambulance workers’ gender identity? Is lifting patients alone a way of performing masculinity for AP’s?

Method
Data is taken from MARS, a panel study of AP workers in Denmark (n = 1606). Information from questionnaires measuring traditional male role norms (MRNI), safety attitudes and safety behavior will be linked to company register information on work injuries categorized as lifting accidents. Logistic regression is used to analyse associations between masculinity, lifting behavior, and lifting accidents.

Results
Reporting moving of lifting patients alone or without AT at t1 is associated with higher risk of reporting lifting injuries at t2 (OR: 1.73 (95% CI: 1.22-2.46)). Higher scores on the measure of traditional male role norms (MRNI) is associated with a greater probability of having lifted or moved patients alone. For those 5% scoring lowest on MRNI the probability of reporting lifting alone was 6% while this figure was 17% for those scoring above the 95th percentile.

Conclusion
This study suggests that male ambulance workers performance of masculinity might pose a threat to their safety. AP’s with the most traditional ideals of masculinity (e.g. those believing that it is masculine to refrain from asking help) are more prone to transgress the safety regulation. Moving or lifting alone increases the risk of lifting accidents.

Implications
Masculinity should be taken into account when developing prevention strategies for AP’s and other male-dominated occupations.