Assessment of the risk of occupational accidents using a “FUZZY” approach

This paper presents an assessment method of the risks of occupational accidents based on fuzzy logic. The purpose of this work was to create a methodological instrument that can semiquantitatively assess the risk of occupational accidents for different industrial and site activities and to identify the most efficient intervention measures that can be taken to reduce risks. This approach, which is new in the assessment of the risk of occupational accidents, allows qualitative, imprecise and in some cases contradictory data to be elaborated, as the data that describe an occupational accident usually are. The set-up analysis model therefore allows (1) an assessment to be made of the level of risk of a work phase and/or a work sector, (2) a verification and quantification to be made of the reduction of the risk after having adopted preventive and/or protective measures and (3) a priority of interventions to be established on the basis of the assessed risk levels. It can be seen how the method, here applied to a company producing industrial vehicle tyres, can be considered applicable for any type of company, with the only prerequisite of having a record of sufficient and homogeneous number of accidents so as to be able to correctly instruct the software and tune the reference parameters.