Musculoskeletal modeling of manual materials handling in the Danish supermarket sector

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(Sebastian Laigaard Skals, Ph.D. student at the National Research Centre for the Working Environment, Aalborg University, 27. July, 2020 )

Every third Danish worker performs manual lifting as part of their daily work tasks, which is a well-known risk factor for the development of back pain. However, existing ergonomic methods for assessing the load on the back during lifting are predominantly based on static or quasi-static biomechanical models, which underestimate the load considerably compared with dynamic models. As a result of decades of research as well as technological developments, it is now possible to use anatomically detailed musculoskeletal models for dynamic analyses of manual lifting tasks. Therefore, the purpose of this project was to extensively analyze the load on the back for a wide range of lifting tasks in the Danish supermarket sector based on state-of-the-art methods for motion analysis and musculoskeletal modeling. This approach will provide new insight into the internal load on the body during common lifting tasks and be an important step towards preventing work-related back disorders in the future.

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