Monitoring exercise-related safety incidents in public exercise facilities: An observational study

This prospective observational study aimed to describe the demographics of new users of training rooms in public exercise facilities in Fujisawa City, Japan, and to monitor exercise-related safety incidents, including adverse events and near-misses, during facility use.The study was conducted between October 2021 and December 2022 and included 1,235 new users (739 men and 496 women) across three public exercise facilities who consented to participate.Participant demographics and health-related characteristics were assessed at baseline, while training room use and safety incidents were prospectively recorded by facility staff.Among the new users, 54.4% of men and 72.9% of women did not report continuous exercise habits.The prevalence of underlying medical conditions and the proportion of participants who responded "yes" to one or more items on the pre-exercise health check increased with age in both sexes.During the observation period, no adverse events or near-misses were reported among the study participants.These findings provide baseline data on user characteristics and safety monitoring outcomes in public exercise facilities and suggest that, even simple pre-exercise health checks may help identify individuals who may require additional attention, given the presence of individuals without regular exercise habits and those with underlying medical conditions.