Injury-related hospital admission of female firefighters in South Korea

Abstract

Purpose. The main objective of this study was to ascertain whether injury-related hospital admission in all South Korea female firefighters is greater than that in the general population. Methods. To perform this comparison, the standardized admission ratios (SARs) and their 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated by person-years and mortality computation software. Results. Compared to the general population, the SARs for overall injury (SAR = 1.57, 95% CI [1.24, 1.96]) and for injury to the lower back (SAR = 2.78, 95% CI [1.81, 4.07]) in the female firefighters were significantly higher. The SARs for injury to the knee (SAR = 2.48, 95% CI [1.18, 4.55]) in emergency medical services (EMS) workers were significantly higher than those in the general population. Conclusions. Our study shows that the SARs of overall injury and injury to the lower back in female firefighters and knee injury in the EMS were significantly higher than those in the general population. Further studies are needed to protect the lower back of firefighters and the knees of EMS.

Keywords:

• female firefighters
• injury
• lower back
• knee

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Min-Gi Kim http://orcid.org/0000-0001-7375-5605

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by the Field-oriented Support of Fire Fighting Technology Research and Development Program funded by the National Fire Agency [MPSS--2017-87].