Completed Feasibility Studies

Health and Safety Needs Assessment of Medically Uninsured and Underinsured Farm Workers in East Texas
Eva Doyle, Ph.D., M.S.Ed., CHES
Mr. Robin Rager, Ph.D., CHES

Purpose: Obtain data using a survey tool in English or Spanish per subject preference, by conducting face-to-face interviews with a convenience sample farm workers (300) in three counties in East Texas to determine work history, recognized work hazards, work-related injuries, health care access, and demographics. Findings will be compared to those reported for general U.S. farmworker and non-farmworker populations and shared with community leaders with assistance to seek funding for either additional data collection or targeted services.
Status: Completed November, 2003

The Use of Syndromic Surveillance to Detect Naturally Occurring or Intentionally Introduced Zoonotic Disease in Agricultural Workers
Laura Banks, DVM
Cameron Crandall, M.D.

Purpose: To evaluate the feasibility of using syndromic surveillance in the agricultural setting to detect zoonotic diseases in agricultural workers. This surveillance could be conducted independently of, or in concert with, surveillance for diseases in animals. This study will entail structured interviews with key informants to answer the following questions:

What are the possible sources of disease syndrome or symptom data?
What is the utility of the currently available syndromic surveillance equipment and procedures in agricultural situations?
What is the willingness of the agricultural community to support surveillance for diseases other than those mandated by health officials?
What are the current methods of data analysis and the utility of the user feedback to the health of agricultural workers?
What are the implications for joint human/animal disease surveillance?
Status: Completed March, 2004

Establishing Exposure Risk for Noise and Organic Solvents Among Farmers
Annette Hurley, M.S., CCC-A

Purpose: It is estimated that nearly 20 million workers in the U.S. are exposed to hazardous levels of noise in the workplace. Further evidence has shown that as many as 30 million American workers may be exposed to hazardous noise and ototoxic chemicals. To date, no published studies have reported hearing loss among agricultural workers as it relates to the type and extent of concomitant pesticide exposure. This feasibility study seeks to assess the risk from both noise and organic solvent exposure from which a risk assessment tool can be developed. This tool will be used to establish methods of data collection for both noise dosimetry and organic solvent exposure in order to pursue future funding to evaluate the two exposures and their effect on threshold shifts.
Status: Completed

Integrating and Adapted Occupational Health Curriculum Into the Farmworker High School Equivalency Program in Brownsville, TX
M. Soledad Vela-Acosta, M.D., M.S., Ph.D.

Purpose: The aim of this study is to test the feasibility of incorporating occupational health and safety knowledge into the current High School Equivalency Program (HEP) sciences curricula for migrant farmworker students using an advisory partnership with Brownsville school district teachers’ team. An existing occupational health/safety curriculum will be adapted and translated into Spanish based on input from HEP teachers and current students. HEP teachers will participate in training sessions to learn innovative methods to teach occupational safety and health. The curriculum will be pilot tested with HEP students enrolled in the fall and spring of the 2004 school year. Student pre-post test time series and post course evaluations will be used to measure retention, applicability of course content. Teachers will provide feedback on ease of integrating material into overall coursework, challenges and successes and willingness to permanently incorporate materials into HEP.
Status: Complete

Occupational Injury Reporting by Farmworkers
Cynthia Ball, D.O., M.S.

Purpose: There is a paucity of research dealing with the prevalence of work injuries among immigrants working in the United States, both agricultural and non-agricultural, and the proportion of those injuries that are reported to employers. Most of the available studies look at the percentage of injured employees who file for workers’ compensation. Yet many of these workers are employed by smaller businesses that are not required to provide worker’s compensation insurance. This study aims to measure the proportion of injured workers who actually report their injury to their employer. The method of enrollment will control for socioeconomic status. We hypothesize that immigrants who are not U.S. citizens are less likely to report injuries than U.S. citizens. U.S. citizen includes naturalized and native-born persons. The study population includes parents of migrant and traditional Head Start programs in Louisiana and West Texas. A simple occupational injury history tool has been designed and translated into Spanish.
Status: Completed, June 2004

Analysis of Factors Contributing to Commercial Fishing Vessel Incidents in U.S. Coast Guard Region 8
Sacha St. Hill, M.D., M.S.

Purpose: The U.S. Coast Guard Region 8 office in New Orleans, LA shared its database of information concerning commercial fishing vessel incidents in its jurisdictional waters for a two-year period.
Status : Complete