Falls on icy surfaces are the leading cause of occupational injuries for workers exposed to outdoor winter conditions. Slip resistant footwear has been shown to reduce the risk of falls for indoor workers but until recently, there was no accepted standard for evaluating the slip resistance of winter footwear on icy surfaces. Our team recently developed a lab-based testing protocol for measuring footwear slip resistance. This protocol, called the Maximum Achievable Angle (MAA) test, measures the steepest ice-covered slope that participants can walk up and down without experiencing a slip in a simulated winter environment. This lab-based protocol has found there is wide variability in the performance of commercially available winter footwear. In particular, we have found that a new generation of footwear that incorporates composite materials in the outsole, performs much better than most other footwear.

The objective of this project was to investigate whether the footwear that performed well in our lab-based testing would reduce the risk of slips and/or falls in real-world winter conditions. One hundred and ten home healthcare workers from SE Health were recruited for this study and were asked to report their exposure to icy surfaces along with the numbers of slips and numbers of falls they experienced each week using online surveys over eight weeks in the winter. Fifty participants (the intervention group) were provided winter footwear that were among the best performing in the MAA test. The remaining sixty participants (the control group) wore their own footwear for the duration of the study.

A total of 563 slips and 36 falls were reported over the eight-week data collection period. The intervention group consistently reported fewer slips (127 vs 436) and fewer falls (6 vs 30) compared to the control group. We found the slip rate in the intervention group was between 68.0% and 68.7% lower than the control group. Similarly, the fall rate was between 78.5% and 81.5% lower in the intervention group compared to the control group. These findings demonstrate that footwear that performs well in the MAA test can reduce the risk of both slips and falls in real-world winter conditions.

对于暴露在冬季户外条件下的工人来说，在结冰的表面上跌倒是职业伤害的主要原因。防滑鞋已被证明可以降低室内工人跌倒的风险，但直到最近，还没有公认的标准来评估冬季鞋在冰面上的防滑性。我们的团队最近开发了一种基于实验室的测试协议，用于测量鞋类防滑性。该协议称为最大可实现角度 (MAA) 测试，测量参与者在模拟冬季环境中可以上下行走而不会滑倒的最陡峭的冰坡。这种基于实验室的协议发现商用冬季鞋的性能存在很大差异。特别是，

该项目的目的是调查在我们的实验室测试中表现良好的鞋类是否会降低真实世界冬季条件下滑倒和/或跌倒的风险。这项研究招募了来自 SE Health 的 110 名家庭医疗保健工作者，他们被要求报告他们在冬季八周内使用在线调查报告他们接触过冰面的次数以及他们每周经历的滑倒次数和跌倒次数。为 50 名参与者（干预组）提供了在 MAA 测试中表现最好的冬季鞋。其余 60 名参与者（对照组）在研究期间穿着自己的鞋子。

在八周的数据收集期间，总共报告了 563 次滑倒和 36 次跌倒。与对照组相比，干预组始终报告更少的滑倒（127 次对 436 次）和更少的跌倒（6 次对 30 次）。我们发现干预组的滑移率比对照组低 68.0% 至 68.7%。同样，与对照组相比，干预组的跌倒率降低了 78.5% 至 81.5%。这些发现表明，在 MAA 测试中表现良好的鞋类可以降低现实世界冬季条件下滑倒和跌倒的风险。