[Cervicobrachial disorders in school-lunch female cooks]

To clarify the relationship between the cervicobrachial disorders in the school-lunch female cooks and number of lunch, 15 elementary school-lunch cooks of O town whose quorum were observed by the standard of the Ministry of Education, Science and Culture and 19 cooks of M town whose quorum was one more than the standard were examined medically and their work conditions were also investigated. Results were as follows: 1) There were significantly (p less than 0.01) more cooks medically classified as "Normal (A)" in M town than in O town. Conversely, cooks classified as "Need therapy (C)" were more numerous in O town (p less than 0.01) than in M town (p less than 0.05). 2) In clinical findings prevalence rates such as median nerve extension test, cinesalgia in the neck, tenderness (flexor tendon of the lst finger of the hand, trapezius muscle, rhomboid muscle, teres minor muscle, brachioradial muscle) were higher in O town cooks than in M town cooks significantly (p less than 0.05). Complaint rates of the subjective symptoms or activities of daily living such as "pain in the neck," "pain in the arms," "want to lie down at free time" were higher in O town cooks than those in M town cooks significantly (p less than 0.05). 3) Average numbers of lunch and classes per cook were 137 lunch and 3.3 classes for O town cooks, and 114 and 2.9 for M town cooks, respectively. The average number of lunch of two towns were significantly different (p less than 0.05).(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)