Study of the Continuous Improvement Trend for Health, Safety and Environmental Indicators, after Establishment of Integrated Management System (IMS) in a Pharmaceutical Industry in Iran

J Clin Diagn Res. 2015 Oct;9(10):LC18-20. doi: 10.7860/JCDR/2015/16160.6700. Epub 2015 Oct 1.

Abstract

Background: Nowadays, organizations try to improve their services and consequently adopt management systems and standards which have become key parts in various industries. One of these management systems which have been noticed in the recent years is Integrated Management System that is the combination of quality, health, safety and environment management systems.

Aim: This study was conducted with the aim of evaluating the improvement trend after establishment of integrated management system for health, safety and environment indicators, in a pharmaceutical industry in Iran.

Materials and methods: First, during several inspections in different parts of the industry, indicators that should have been noted were listed and then these indicators were organized in 3 domains of health, safety and environment in the form of a questionnaire that followed Likert method of scaling. Also, the weight of each index was resulted from averaging out of 30 managers and the viewpoints of the related experts in the field. Moreover, by checking the documents and evidence of different years (5 contemplation years of this study), the score of each indicator was determined by multiplying the weight and score of the indices and were finally analysed.

Results: Over 5 years, scores of health scope indicators, increased from 161.99 to 202.23. Score in the first year after applying the integrated management system establishment was 172.37 in safety part and in the final year increased to 197.57. The changes of environmental scope rates, from the beginning of the program up to the last year increased from 49.24 to 64.27.

Conclusion: Integrated management systems help organizations to improve programs to achieve their objectives. Although in this study all trends of health, safety and environmental indicator changes were positive, but at the same time showed to be slow. So, one can suggest that the result of an annual evaluation should be applied in planning future activities for the years ahead.

Keywords: Industrial safety; Occupational health; Quantitative indicators; Standards.