Risk assessment

The overall process of identifying and analyzing risks. The process of characterizing hazards within risk areas by analyzing them for their potential mishap consequences and probabilities of occurrence, and combining the two estimates to reach a risk rating.

In brief, it is the qualitative or quantitative estimation of the likelihood of adverse effects of something hazardous.

A process which estimates the likelihood that exposed people may have health effects. Steps in risk assessment for a given exposure include: (1) hazard identification, or the evaluation of evidence on negative effects on human health from the exposure; (2) exposure assessment, or determination of the specific agents, routes, amount and duration of exposure causing human damage; (3) dose-response estimation, to extrapolate available evidence on the relation between dose and adverse health response to human conditions of exposure; and (4) risk characterisation, combining exposure assessment with dose response assessment to quantify the risks from a given exposure to human populations. From some occupational epidemiology studies, usually cohort studies, dose-response relations can be derived and used to set regulatory standards, although most epidemiological research can only contribute to occupational hazard identification or to explore the plausibility of resumed exposure/ disease associations (for example, from animal experiments).