Object Oriented Modeling of the Health and Safety Process in the Case of the Agricultural Work

The agricultural work is associated with a series of adverse health effects. The causation of the work related problems is being discussed in many research papers. The extensive literature review revealed a series of factors that have been found to be directly or indirectly related with farmersʹ health. These factors fall into five major categories, namely the exposure to hazardous agents, the type of agricultural work, the level of use of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), specific demographic characteristics and finally cognitive factors. The understanding of the above parameters is of great importance for Primary Healthcare and, in specific for the support of one of its functions, which is Occupational Health and Safety. The aforementioned parameters are interrelated through a specific schema, which in fact describes the occupational health and safety considerations. The current study describes the modeling of the above internal process of the agricultural work. This is achieved through an object oriented modeling procedure that may be used from one part for the overall understanding of farmersʹ health dynamic by primary healthcare professionals and from the other part as a tool to support the development process of Primary Healthcare and Occupational Health and Safety Information Systems in rural areas.