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ISSN 1051-9815 (P)
ISSN 1875-9270 (E)
Impact Factor 2024: 1.7
WORK: A Journal of Prevention, Assessment & Rehabilitation is an interdisciplinary, international journal which publishes high quality peer-reviewed manuscripts covering the entire scope of the occupation of work. The journal's subtitle has been deliberately laid out: The first goal is the prevention of illness, injury, and disability. When this goal is not achievable, the attention focuses on assessment to design client-centered intervention, rehabilitation, treatment, or controls that use scientific evidence to support best practice.
WORK occasionally publishes thematic issues, but in general, issues cover a wide range of topics such as ergonomic considerations with children, youth and students, the challenges facing an aging workforce, workplace violence, injury management, performing artists, ergonomic product evaluations, and the awareness of the political, cultural, and environmental determinants of health related to work.
Dr. Karen Jacobs, the founding editor, and her editorial board especially encourage the publication of research studies, clinical practice, case study reports, as well as personal narratives and critical reflections of lived work experiences (autoethnographic/autobiographic scholarship),
Sounding Board commentaries and
Speaking of Research articles which provide the foundation for better understanding research to facilitate knowledge dissemination.
Narrative Reflections on Occupational Transitions, a new column, is for persons who have successfully transitioned into, between, or out of occupations to tell their stories in a narrative form. With an internationally renowned editorial board,
WORK maintains high standards in the evaluation and publication of manuscripts. All manuscripts are reviewed expeditiously and published in a timely manner.
WORK prides itself on being an author-friendly journal.
WORK celebrates its 25th anniversary in 2015.
*WORK is affiliated with the Canadian Association of Occupational Therapists (CAOT)* *WORK is endorsed by the International Ergonomics Association (IEA)* *WORK gives out the yearly Cheryl Bennett Best Paper Award*
Abstract: Surgical staff is considered to have several ergonomic risk factors, but their physical workload and musculoskeletal health have seldom been evaluated. Clinical examinations of neck and upper extremities were performed in 99 theatre nurses and 93 assisting nurses, all females. Their physical workload was assessed by questionnaire, and by technical measurements of postures, movements and muscular load in subgroups of both categories. The prevalences of diagnoses in neck/shoulders were not remarkably high in the nurses, compared to other occupational groups. In elbows/hands though, the prevalence was rather high among assistant nurses, 13 vs. 5 % in theatre nurses; POR…3.0 (CI 95 % 1.0 – 8.9). Theatre nurses experienced prolonged static postures in the questionnaire, whilst assistant nurses reported high physical load. Accordingly, the technical measurements showed more strenuous working postures in the theatre nurses, but lower wrist angular velocities. The time proportion of muscular rest in m.trapezius was rather high in both groups. Although both groups had some stressful loads they had relatively low prevalence of diagnoses in neck/shoulders. The high proportion of muscular rest may be protective. The elevated risk of elbows/hands diagnoses among assistant nurses may be explained by strenuous work tasks of short duration.
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Abstract: This study evaluated the risks for cardiovascular disease and the life habits of garment industry workers in northwestern Paraná state, Brazil. The following parameters were assessed: body composition, cardiorespiratory fitness, eating habits and physical activities by garment industry workers. Cardiovascular risk was observed in some of the studied subjects, in the form of high BMI and reduced maximal oxygen uptake. The development of a workplace quality-of-life program is suggested, aiming to stimulate the development of physical activities to improve the cardiovascular conditioning of workers.
Abstract: One of the major problems encountered in health care during the process of implementing ergonomic changes is the lack of space. There is often not enough space to work with larger equipment like patient lifters and shower chairs or other medical devices necessary in a preventive program. This leads to undesirable extra physical load for nurses. Therefore it is imperative that in the process of designing the health care environment ergonomic considerations are taken into account. A method to assess the optimum size and shape of the space required is developed and the value of the method is tested in…a pilot setting. The pilot is currently underway and the results will be presented on the final poster.
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Keywords: nurses, architecture, building
DOI: 10.3233/WOR-2012-0907-5650
Citation: Work,
vol. 41, no. Supplement 1, pp. 5650-5651, 2012
Abstract: This study evaluated the influence an abdominal support attached to a traditional stool, of those used by dentists, has on the body’s distribution of the electrical activity of the superior trapezius and the longissimus thoracic muscles of dental students during the execution of a clinical procedure. The results showed no significant difference in the body’s distribution in the seat and backrest, but did reveal there was a weight discharge of 3.1±1.9% of dentist’s body weight in the abdominal support. The 9 o’clock position proved to be the best position to perform clinical procedures. It was also observed that the position…was closer to the body’s axis.
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Abstract: In order to implement preventive programs to prevent back pain in nurses, assessments of the degree of passivity and mobility of patients is imperative. After all, the load in health care ergonomics, is often the patient. The degree of cooperation or resistance determines the load on the back for the nurses and the necessity of the use of lifting devices like patient lifters or sliding sheets. These assessments must be done in both a practical and a reliable way. For this purpose a 3-category and a 5- category system to assess the degree of patient mobility and passivity was developed…and tested. The results are presented on the poster.
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Keywords: ergonomics, prevention, back pain, patient assessment, nurse
DOI: 10.3233/WOR-2012-0909-5655
Citation: Work,
vol. 41, no. Supplement 1, pp. 5655-5656, 2012
Abstract: Research can point to new opportunities and assist in the development of valid business cases to help nurse managers plan change and allocate their budgets to the most promising interventions. These business cases and their results will, in turn, pave the way for more in depth and more fundamental research into implementation processes. It will add to the body of knowledge of intervention research and ultimately hopefully also add to our understanding of why ergonomic interventions in the workplace will or will not be effective and what the impact of financial constraints is. It is difficult to develop and design…a valid businesscase. This poster will present one of the possible strategies to develop one.
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Keywords: innovation, implementation, back pain, patient handling, ergonomic approach, nursing
DOI: 10.3233/WOR-2012-0910-5657
Citation: Work,
vol. 41, no. Supplement 1, pp. 5657-5658, 2012
Abstract: The purpose of this study was to clarify the characteristic of workloads on human care worker with the introduction of IT system, and suggested the support measures for KAIZEN in Japan. The investigation method is workflow line and hearing with a focus on work observation. The objects were 8 human care workers of the acute hospital that introduced an electronic system. By the introduction of the electronic chart, the nurse station sojourn time decreased, sickroom sojourn time increased, and time about direct nursing care to a patient increased. In addition, access to patient information became easy, and the offer of…the health care service based on correct information came to be possible in real time. By The point of workflow line, it was effect that moving lengths decreased in order to install the electronic chart in patients’ rooms. Though, it was a problem that it hasn’t formed where to place the instruments such as sphygmomanometer, clinical thermometer and others.
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Keywords: work loads, KAIZEN, human care worker, workflow line, IT system
DOI: 10.3233/WOR-2012-0911-5659
Citation: Work,
vol. 41, no. Supplement 1, pp. 5659-5661, 2012
Abstract: This study seeks to evaluate the effect of regular and new nursing methods in nursing care work. Nursing care work often causes low back pain in nursing care worker. The principle of not lifting when transferring patients has been proposed as one way to prevent low back pain. This principle incorporates the use of the patient’s strength and assistant aids. A sliding seats and transfer boards have been proposed as assistant aids for the transferring patients. It is necessary to evaluate the effectiveness of these assistant aids in preventing low back pain. Ten subjects performed two tasks in this experiment.…Five were nursing experienced persons and five were the inexperienced. EMG results indicated that the new nursing method was less stressful than the methods. A questionnaire revealed that the new method was evaluated more highly than the regular method. Based on these results, we propose that a sliding seats and transfer boards be used in nursing care work.
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Abstract: Medication error is an issue that no hospital is immune from, leading to 7,000 deaths and 1.3 million patient injuries each year. The purpose of this study was to decrease the risk and occurrence of medication errors by analyzing the hospital pharmacy. Task analyses were performed and it was found that communication, expectation, and procedural issues were leading to the occurrence of the most common type of medication error in the pharmacy. Recommendations were made to improve the process and reduce the occurrence of this type of error.
Abstract: This article uses the contributions of ergonomics to understand the work performed by hotel managers. The concern to understand the job of managers is something new in the ergonomics and few studies address this issue, especially in what concerns the work of hotel managers and its aspects of performance and health, which is the focus of this article. Through a literature review on the subject, it is sought to understand the managers’ work activity, the impacts on their health and their organizational performance, as managers take an ambivalent position in organizations, since they have to deal directly with the demands…of upper and lower hierarchies in a context of high competition, organizational changes and user requirements. It is then inferred there is a risk of increased work density for managers, bringing negative consequences to their health and organizational performance. This phenomenon, still poorly covered by ergonomics, contributes to a certain invisibility of the manager’s work in society as a whole, when the manager may suffer from health problems, which are also common in certain populations of workers who do not take the managerial function.
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