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Mental health staff are at risk of sustaining injury from the application of physical intervention, two recent studies reporting that the risk is almost one in every five inidents. It is important that health care organisations are proactive in attempting to reduce the injuries to staff from all sources. Current physical intervention training focuses on safeguarding staff from physical assault and little time is dedicated to ensuring that staff use ergonomically safe and efficient body postures while using physical interventions, in spite of the risk of work‐related musculoskeletal disorders. To combat this problem, those in general nursing have produced a variety of risk assessment tools and conducted research on optimal ways of conducting manual handling training so that staff receive optimal uptake and transference of information from training. This article reviews the research in general nursing and analyses it with a view to informing future physical intervention training programmes.

The purpose of this paper is to review the prevalence and risk factors of work-related musculoskeletal disorders (WMSDs) among healthcare workers (HCWs) in order to ascertain the occupation with the highest susceptibility to WMSD in the health sector. This paper will also review the effective interventions which have been used to prevent WMSDs among HCWs.

This study is a literature review of 11 papers related to the prevalence and risk factors of WMSDs and 12 papers about the interventions being used to prevent WMSDs among HCWs. The papers were retrieved from respectable databases such as PubMed, Science Direct, Google Scholar and E-Thesis.

Nurses belong to the major group of HCWs who had the highest prevalence of WMSDs compared with other health professionals and other hospital workers. Although there are several interventions being commonly used to prevent WMSD risk factors, some interventions were unsuccessful in the prevention of WMSDs in healthcare tasks. Therefore, it is necessary that future research focuses on the tasks of HCWs that are WMSD risk factors and tries to innovate or redesign ergonomic workstations to prevent those risk factors.

The expected benefit of this study is to motivate ergonomists to provide appropriate and innovative interventions to ensure health and safety for nurses and other HCWs.

Different organisations have developed policies and programmes to prevent workplace injuries and facilitate return to work. Few multiple workplace studies have examined workers’ perceptions of these policies and programmes. The purpose of this paper is to compare workers’ perception and experience of workplace policies and practices on injury prevention, people-oriented work culture, and return to work.

This study recruited 118 workers from three healthcare facilities through an online and paper survey.

Work-related musculoskeletal injury was experienced by 46 per cent of the workers, with low back injuries being most prevalent. There were significant differences in perception of policies and practices for injury prevention among occupational groups, and between workers who have had previous workplace injury experience and those without past injury.

Selection bias is possible because of voluntary participation. A larger sample could give stronger statistical power.

The perception of workplace policies can vary depending on workers’ occupational and injury status. Organisational managers need to pay attention to the diversity among workers when designing and implementing injury prevention and return to work policies.

Risks for workplace injuries are related to multiple factors, including workplace policies and practices on health and safety. Workers’ understanding and response to the policies, programmes, and practices can determine injury outcomes.

No previous study has reported on workers’ perceptions of workplace policies and practices for injury prevention and return in Manitoba healthcare sector.

This pragmatic research paper aims to unravel the smart vision-based method (SVBM), an AI program to correlate the computer vision (recorded and live videos using mobile and embedded cameras) that aids in manual lifting human pose deduction, analysis and training in the construction sector.

Using a pragmatic approach combined with the literature review, this study discusses the SVBM. The research method includes a literature review followed by a pragmatic approach and lab validation of the acquired data. Adopting the practical approach, the authors of this article developed an SVBM, an AI program to correlate computer vision (recorded and live videos using mobile and embedded cameras).

Results show that SVBM observes the relevant events without additional attachments to the human body and compares them with the standard axis to identify abnormal postures using mobile and other cameras. Angles of critical nodal points are projected through human pose detection and calculating body part movement angles using a novel software program and mobile application. The SVBM demonstrates its ability to data capture and analysis in real-time and offline using videos recorded earlier and is validated for program coding and results repeatability.

Literature review methodology limitations include not keeping in phase with the most updated field knowledge. This limitation is offset by choosing the range for literature review within the last two decades. This literature review may not have captured all published articles because the restriction of database access and search was based only on English. Also, the authors may have omitted fruitful articles hiding in a less popular journal. These limitations are acknowledged. The critical limitation is that the trust, privacy and psychological issues are not addressed in SVBM, which is recognised. However, the benefits of SVBM naturally offset this limitation to being adopted practically.

The theoretical and practical implications include customised and individualistic prediction and preventing most posture-related hazardous behaviours before a critical injury happens. The theoretical implications include mimicking the human pose and lab-based analysis without attaching sensors that naturally alter the working poses. SVBM would help researchers develop more accurate data and theoretical models close to actuals.

By using SVBM, the possibility of early deduction and prevention of musculoskeletal disorders is high; the social implications include the benefits of being a healthier society and health concerned construction sector.

Human pose detection, especially joint angle calculation in a work environment, is crucial to early deduction of muscoloskeletal disorders. Conventional digital technology-based methods to detect pose flaws focus on location information from wearables and laboratory-controlled motion sensors. For the first time, this paper presents novel computer vision (recorded and live videos using mobile and embedded cameras) and digital image-related deep learning methods without attachment to the human body for manual handling pose deduction and analysis of angles, neckline and torso line in an actual construction work environment.

In certain industrial operations, workers are required to stand for a prolonged duration. This leads to muscular fatigue in the legs, posing a threat to the productivity and well-being of the workers. This paper aims to address this problem of women in the clothing industry with an exoskeleton designed for lower extremities and improve productivity.

Ulrich’s product design approach has been followed with suitable modifications. The methodology involves a study to justify the need for this product and terminating at the physical and virtual evaluations of the product. Required anthropometric parameters are considered along the design process.

The exoskeleton discussed in this paper is an innovative product made of Aluminium 6061 alloy. During the simulation phase of the product, total von-mises stresses to a part bearing 1 leg were 31.5 MPa, 94.7 MPa and 284 MPa for aluminium, SS308 and springs, respectively. These values are below the yield limit by a great margin. Based on a user survey of this product, 72% of the targeted customers were interested in buying. Also, comparing electromyography (EMG) mean value of the voltage between workers’ leg with and without exoskeleton revealed that there was an improvement in the voltage by 2.5% when exoskeleton was used.

This paper emphasizes, for the first time – the necessity of an exoskeleton indigenized for the Indian population and the process of realizing it by designing an exoskeleton.

Various occupations in life require personnel to stand for a prolonged period of time. This causes excessive stress on the joints leading to musculoskeletal disorders. This paper aims to design an equipment ensure the personnel rests on whenever necessary.

The method followed in this paper is the adoption of Karl Ulrich’s product design methodology with suitable modifications as per requirement. Human anthropometric data from the Indian population has been considered during the design and modelled according to it using computer aided design and computer aided engineering tools.

The conceptual equipment – exoskeleton designed sustained loads of human beings and proved to be a safe design in terms of the strength of the material used in the design.

This design can serve as equipment, which helps the personnel with long-standing work hours to relieve themselves without actually sitting.

The design has been carefully crafted based on the inputs from the anthropometric features of human beings, which is completely passive in nature i.e. no use of external power is required for this exoskeleton compared to the other available designs.

Low back disorder is one of the most prevalent and costly injuries in the construction industry. Back-support exoskeletons are increasingly perceived as promising solutions. However, the intended benefits of exoskeletons may not be realized if intention-to-use the device is low. Social influence could increase intention-to-use exoskeletons. This study aims to evaluate the impact of social influence on construction workers' intention-to-use back-support exoskeletons.

A field study involving 37 construction workers was conducted, with workers who used exoskeleton for one week, and their peers and supervisors. Data were collected using questionnaires and semi-structured interviews, and analyzed using descriptive statistics and thematic analysis, respectively.

The workers felt that the exoskeleton is easy to use and the functions are well integrated. Workers' intention-to-use exoskeleton was mainly influenced by employers providing and requiring the use of the device. The attitude of the workers and the perception of peers and supervisors did not have a significant impact on workers' intention-to-use exoskeleton, whereas the subjective norm of construction workers had a positive impact on the intention-to-use exoskeletons.

The study involved only 37 workers, including 15 workers who used the exoskeleton, and 14 peers and 8 supervisors of the workers.

This study contributes to existing knowledge on the influence of social influence on intention-to-use exoskeletons. The study also highlights how exoskeleton designs and the construction workplace can influence behavioral intention-to-use exoskeletons.

Concrete workers perform physically demanding work in awkward postures, exposing their backs to musculoskeletal disorders. Back-support exoskeletons are promising ergonomic interventions designed to reduce the risks of back disorders. However, the suitability of exoskeletons for enhancing performance of concrete workers has not been largely explored. This study aims to assess a passive back-support exoskeleton for concrete work in terms of the impact on the body, usability and benefits of the exoskeleton, and potential design modifications.

Concrete workers performed work with a passive back-support exoskeleton. Subjective and qualitative measures were employed to capture their perception of the exoskeleton, at the middle and end of the work, in terms of discomfort to their body parts, ease of use, comfort, performance and safety of the exoskeleton, and their experience using the exoskeleton. These were analyzed using descriptive statistics and thematic analysis.

The exoskeleton reduced stress on the lower back but caused discomfort to other body parts. Significant correlations were observed between perceived discomfort and usability measures. Design modifications are needed to improve the compatibility of the exoskeleton with the existing safety gears, reduce discomfort at chest and thigh, and improve ease of use of the exoskeleton.

The study was conducted with eight concrete workers who used the exoskeleton for four hours.

This study contributes to existing knowledge on human-wearable robot interaction and provides suggestions for adapting exoskeleton designs for construction work.

The physically-demanding and repetitive nature of construction work often exposes workers to work-related musculoskeletal injuries. Real-time information about the ergonomic consequences of workers' postures can enhance their ability to control or self-manage their exposures. This study proposes a digital twin framework to improve self-management ergonomic exposures through bi-directional mapping between workers' postures and their corresponding virtual replica.

The viability of the proposed approach was demonstrated by implementing the digital twin framework on a simulated floor-framing task. The proposed framework uses wearable sensors to track the kinematics of workers' body segments and communicates the ergonomic risks via an augmented virtual replica within the worker's field of view. Sequence-to-sequence long short-term memory (LSTM) network is employed to adapt the virtual feedback to workers' performance.

Results show promise for reducing ergonomic risks of the construction workforce through improved awareness. The experimental study demonstrates feasibility of the proposed approach for reducing overexertion of the trunk. Performance of the LSTM network improved when trained with augmented data but at a high computational cost.

Suggested actionable feedback is currently based on actual work postures. The study is experimental and will need to be scaled up prior to field deployment.

This study reveals the potentials of digital twins for personalized posture training and sets precedence for further investigations into opportunities offered by digital twins for improving health and wellbeing of the construction workforce.