RR613 Whole-body vibration and ergonomics of driving occupations. Phase 2: Port vehicles
Back disorders are the most common form of ill health at work and this is one reason why HSE has made reducing their prevalence a priority.
The work reported here is the second part of a project looking at whole-body vibration exposure and other ergonomic risk factors for back pain from driving occupations. Phase 1 of the project is reported in RR612. The project is an exploratory study of back pain in drivers. The small sample size of the study means that it will not be possible to draw strong conclusions about relationships between exposure data and self-reported musculoskeletal disorders. However as future studies use the data collection toolkit developed during this project to add to the library of data, it will be possible to analyse the records for evidence of possible combined effects of whole-body vibration and ergonomic stressors as sources of back pain.
Phase 2 of the project, essentially a data gathering exercise, involved applying the toolkit to a number of vehicles. The part of Phase 2 concerned with port vehicles is reported here. Eight port vehicles were studied for this part of the project.
This report and the work it describes were funded by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). Its contents, including any opinions and/or conclusions expressed, are those of the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect HSE policy.
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