Promoting a Shared Representation of Workers' Activities to Improve Integrated Prevention of Work-Related Musculoskeletal Disorders

Effective and sustainable prevention of work-related musculoskeletal disorders (WR-MSDs) remains a challenge for preventers and policy makers. Coordination of stakeholders involved in the prevention of WR-MSDs is a key factor that requires greater reflection on common knowledge and shared representation of workers\u27 activities among stakeholders. Information on workers\u27 strategies and operational leeway should be the core of common representations, because it places workers at the center of the "work situation system" considered by the intervention models. Participatory ergonomics permitting debates among stakeholders about workers\u27 activity and strategies to cope with the work constraints in practice could help them to share representations of the "work situation system" and cooperate. Sharing representation therefore represents a useful tool for prevention, and preventers should provide sufficient space and time for dialogue and discussion of workers\u27 activities among stakeholders during the conception, implementation, and management of integrated prevention programs

Conception d’instruments de taille de la vigne : approche interdisciplinaire d’une activité saisonnière

International audienc

Des pathologies parfois très invalidantes : Troubles Musculo-Squelettiques, à quand une prévention durable ?

Du poignet à l\u27épaule, les troubles musculo-squelettiques présentent les mêmes symptômes : douleurs et gêne pour effectuer certains gestes.Ils revêtent parfois des formes aggravées, qui nécessitent des prises en charge adaptées

Low back pain, intervertebral disc and occupational diseases

Nonspecific low back pain and sciatica are prevalent diseases among working adults and have become a worrying occupational health issue because they sometimes affect continuation or resumption of employment. Epidemiological studies that based questionnaires on workers\u27 healthcare consumption have shown a higher prevalence of these disorders in certain industrial sectors. Thus, low back disorders are usually more prevalent among workers exposed to cumulative lumbar load such as manual handling, awkward postures of the trunk and whole-body vibrations. In addition, morphological and biomechanical studies have compared disc space narrowing and the intensity of lumbar workload. Although debated, the relationship between disc degeneration and biomechanical work exposures seems to be usually accepted by most authors. In response to a considerable need of prevention and compensation for workers, low back pain and/or disc disease can be recognized as an occupational diseases in several countries but the criteria of recognition remains heterogeneous from one country to another