Taxonomy and procedures to characterize occupational hazards (risk factors) at workplace level: incorporating new knowledge in hazards identification

This article presents hazard or risk factors taxonomy, organized as a matrix or checklist (Risk Factors-Disorders Matrix), to be applied at workplace level, during the systematic hazards identification at a specific workplace. This matrix or checklist serves as a quasi-exhaustive list of occupational hazards, allowing the safety and health technician to observe the work environment with an extensive checklist of risk factors, checking the identified hazards, and questioning systematically all the remaining hazards observed in the matrix. An appeal to take into consideration individual risk factors, emerging risk factors and work related diseases is present in the risk factors-disorders matrix. It is proposed an organization of risk factors in terms of the potential individual dominant consequences: risk factors with dominant consequences in terms of accidents (injuries), occupational disease or in terms of negative mental or physical well-being, like discomfort complaints and insatisfaction not directly related to injuries or diseases symptomatology.