Work-related musculoskeletal disorders in vulnerable populations: what are the most common body parts affected?

Studies investigating vulnerable populations have shown that work-related musculoskeletal disorders have a negative impact on quality of life. However, no study has examined the body regions commonly affected by work-related musculoskeletal disorders in vulnerable populations.

To describe the body regions commonly affected by work-related musculoskeletal disorders in vulnerable populations.

Cross-sectional study. We used the ABEP questionnaire, the World Health Organization Quality of Life, the Nordic Musculoskeletal Disorders Questionnaire, the Perceived Stress Scale, and a self-report questionnaire to determine morning-evening in human circadian rhythms (chronotype assessment). To reduce the possibility of information bias, we provided prior training in the use of the instruments and created an electronic database that was filled out in duplicate (in cases of disagreement, a third researcher was consulted). We tested the normality of the data using the Shapiro-Wilk test.

The sample consisted of 132 participants, but there was a sample loss of 41.6% (final sample n = 77). We observed the predominance of those who worked from 6 to 8 h/day, rest of 1 h during the working day, from 1 to 10 years of service and only 1 employment relationship. Regarding the quality of life, we observed a worse result in the domain related to the environment, as well as a stress level of 15.43 (± 7.52) with a maximum of 30. Finally, we observed the presence of pain self-reported by the artisanal fishermen in several regions of the body, lumbar being the most mentioned.

The neck, shoulders, arms, elbows, forearms, wrists, back, lumbar spine, and lower limbs are the most common parts of the body affected by work-related musculoskeletal disorders in artisanal fishermen.