Mikal Zemljak

Date of Award

Spring 2016

Degree Type

Non-Thesis Project

Degree Name

MS Industrial Hygiene

Department

Industrial Hygiene

Committee Chair

Julie Hart

First Advisor

Terry Spear

Abstract

Behavior Based Safety has become a growing concern in many workplaces over the last decade. Many companies do not have a strong safety program to protect themselves, as well as their employees, from human error incidents and accidents caused from the use of substances. This technical report investigates the connection between the frequency of drug and alcohol screenings to the incident and accident rate each year at a specific lumber facility in the Northwest United States.

The lumber facility experienced several policy changes due to reoccurring incidents and accidents. The most common abused substances included: marijuana, alcohol, and tobacco. These policy changes included the addition of pre-employment and post-accident screenings, random drug and alcohol screens, reasonable suspicion drug and alcohol screens, and observed substance abuse screens.

Data collected over a four year and eight month period did not detect a direct relationship among incident and accident rates. Although there wasn't a correlation, substance abuse was proven to have a positive connection with workplace safety at the lumber facility.

Comments

This IH Report is submitted to the Department of Safety, Health, and Industrial Hygiene Montana Tech of the University of Montana for the degree of Masters of Science in Industrial Hygiene

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