Differences in occupational health and safety efforts between adopters and non-adopters of certified occupational health and safety management systems

•A survey of 4,202 Danish workplaces compares OHS efforts of adopters and non-adopters of Certified OHS Management Systems (COHSMSs).•Two main dimensions of the OHS efforts are evaluated: the ‘systematic process-related’ OHS efforts and the ‘content-related’ OHS efforts.•Adopters of COHSMSs have a higher overall level of both systematic process-related OHS efforts and content-related OHS efforts, compared to non-adopters.•The study therefore supports the assumption that COHSMS adopters generally perform a higher level of OHS management than non-adopters do.