ERGONOMIC ASPECTS OF OLDER WORKERS POSTURAL BALANCE

拟议的研究提供了一种实验设计，解决了国家职业研究议程(NORA)的两个优先领域，即“工伤”和“特殊危险人群--老年工人所经历的特殊危险因素的性质和程度”随着美国老龄化，预计2000年将有至少5,900万人年龄在45岁到之间。随着强制退休年龄的取消，将老年工人视为一种资源的观点正在取代老年工人作为一种负债的观点。因此，需要仔细研究这一新的不断增长的老年工人队伍，以根据一些与工作相关的需求和与任务相关的因素以及环境风险因素来确定他们的能力和局限性。因此，本研究将重点探讨年龄相关的影响对113名工人的神经肌肉表现和在任务执行过程中保持安全直立姿势平衡的能力的影响，例如伸手和弯腰拿起物体，以及在不同类型的鞋类磨损的不同表面(已知滑度的水平和坡面)上负重行走。拟议研究的结果将扩大我们目前的年轻(21至55岁)数据库。工人的能力和限制，包括75岁以下的老年工人的能力和限制。根据本研究的结果，可以在未来的研究中制定预防跌倒/失去平衡的干预策略：(1)通过改善次优的环境条件；(2)通过开发符合人体工程学的解决方案，将工作量降低到可接受的水平；(3)通过确定在发生滑倒/跌倒时更危险的某些风险因素组合；以及(4)通过确定是否需要在斜坡角安装低于OSHA目前要求的扶手。目前，在湿滑的坡道上执行任务时，没有需要扶手的标准。这项拟议研究的结果将提供科学数据，以确定老年工人是否有能力在各种风险因素组合下在坡道表面执行任务。

The proposed study provides an experimental design that addresses two of the priority areas of National Occupational Research Agenda (NORA), i.e. "Work related traumatic injuries" and "Special population at risk-nature and magnitude of the special risk factors experienced by older workers" With the aging of America, it is projected that in the year 2000 there will be at least 59 million between the ages of 45 and 64 yrs. As mandatory retirement age has been abolished, the view of the older worker as a resource is replacing the perspective of the older workers as a liability. Therefore, this new growing workforce of elderly workers needs to be studied carefully to determine their abilities and limitations in the light of some of the work related demands and task associated and environmental risk factors. Therefore, the present study will focus on investigating the role of age associated influence on 113 workers' neuromuscular performance and ability to maintain safe upright postural balance during task performance, such as reaching and bending to pick up objects and walking with weights in hand on various types of surfaces (level and ramp surfaces of known slipperiness) with various kinds of shoe wear. The results from the proposed study will expand our current data base of younger (21 to 55 yrs.) workers' abilities and limitation to include those of older workers up to the age of 75 years. Based on results of the present study, intervention strategies for fall/loss of balance prevention can be developed in a future study: (1) by improving suboptimal environmental conditions; (2) by developing ergonomic solutions to bring the workload to acceptable levels; (3) by identifying certain combinations of risk factors that are more dangerous in producing slips/falls and (4) by determining if there is a need to have hand rails at ramp slope angles less than that currently required by OSHA. Currently, no criteria exists for the need to have handrails during task performance on ramps which are slippery. The results from the proposed study will provide scientific data to determine whether or not older workers are capable of performing tasks on ramp surfaces under various combinations of risk factors.