Matthew Keifer, MD, MPH, David Bonauto, MD This project aims to estimate the proportion of teenage children who work for pay in agriculturally related jobs in a rural town in Washington's Yakima Valley. Secondary goals are to estimate the injury rate among the teenage workers in the sample, to identify the patterns of work in relationship to school and to characterize the treatment and outcome of these work related injuries. A random digit dialing survey targeted to a rural town composed of nonmigratory agriculture workers of Mexican descent will be employed to obtain the above estimates.
Agricultural work is among the most dangerous occupations in the United States.
Children are a vital component of the agricultural work force both as non paid family members or as paid laborers. Estimates of injury rates to children working in agriculture have utilized national data banks, and hospital and clinic based surveillance systems. Direct assessment, via household sampling or telephone sampling of the proportion of teenagers working and the percent injured, is sparsely reported in the literature and has not been performed in teenagers working in agriculture in the Northwest United States. Furthermore, an understanding of the patterns of work and the occurrence of injury in Hispanic teenage workers is lacking. This project addresses the NORA Priority Research Areas of traumatic injuries and special populations at risk.