Effects of neuromuscular fatigue on workplace tasks

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Musculoskeletal injuries to the upper extremity and low back related to manual material handling in the workplace have become a societal burden in terms of stress on the health care system not to mention the health and well-being of the injured employees themselves. Many of the injuries are a function of the repetitive and prolonged nature of the work resulting in a state of muscle fatigue, a known predisposition for the injury. What is not clearly understood however, are the accommodations workers make to their work technique in light of fatigued muscles. Our research has demonstrated the effects on muscle fatigue and strength recovery when subjected to repeated submaximal workloads while performing sagittal constrained lifting activities. We have also identified differences in coordinated movement patterns in individuals who later developed low back pain at work. The proposed research will investigate the modifications to the coordinated movement patterns when workers perform complex, fatiguing work tasks. An understanding of the effects of neuromuscular fatigue on individual coordination and movement patterns is a critical step towards developing guidelines and work strategies to reduce the incidence of workplace associated musculoskeletal injuries and determining the most advantageous work to rest guidelines.