Taxonomy refers to a classification system. In safety there are several different ones (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safety_taxonomy) Some of these are helpful, others less so. In terms of industrial injuries, the most common would simply be classification as first aid, medical treatment etc, but there are other industry specific ones (e.g. https://www.skybrary.aero/index.php/Injury_Level_Taxonomy) and certain legislative-based reporting requirements (http://www.hse.gov.uk/riddor/reportable-incidents.htm).
As to the question - yes they have proved popular. Whether they have proved effective or not is a different, and more interesting, question. In theory, they should help us analyse data and improve. In practice - maybe not.

Thanks very much Craig. I was struggling to find useful information on it.

thank you. lkeighleyatabergeldiedotcom

Hi Lee,

Taxonomy is another word for classification, I worked with them when in records management :-)

Here is a rocket ship of incident/injury taxonomy with active links to explore, the CDC ‘Occupational Injury and Illness Classification System’ https://wwwn.cdc.gov/wisards/oiics/Trees/MultiTree.aspx?TreeType=Event

Fun to play with, you will see taxonomy trees for Nature of injury, Part of Body, Source, and the Event.

The great thing about a good incident taxonomy is the ability to analyse data and trends. ACC would have very extensive taxonomies, whereas a workplace Incident Reporting system would have a less complex one, still with the ability to identify trends so to hopefully think of the best controls

FYI - a related taxonomy system is Bloom's Taxonomy of Learning - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloom%27s_taxonomy

Bloom's Taxonomy can be very helpful for identifying competency requirements to ensure learning design, training delivery and learner assessment actually deliver the level of competence required / expected.