Let us define arthroscopic surgeon's ergonomics! design of visualisation and evaluation approaches of surgical...

Surgical ergonomics is a public health challenge that ensures the well-being of both surgeons and patients. Non-ergonomic postures lead to the development of work-related musculoskeletal disorders, causing pain and fatigue for surgeons. It is therefore essential to identify and recognise these postures and to establish the key elements that may help in assessing surgical ergonomics. The objective of this study is to provide additional key insights into the definition of surgical ergonomics.

Four expert orthopaedic surgeon trainers were interviewed in semi-structured sessions. The protocol consisted of four non-directed stages with open questions and one directed stage with a presentation. Interviews were manually transcribed and analysed by one operator.

Eight categories were derived from the interviews, encompassing the key points that define the expected and observed surgical ergonomics according to experts. To clearly define each category, remarks, advice, metrics, and visualisations were collected and interlinked. Interviews provided a list of relevant postural variables (metrics) and advice for assessing and improving ergonomics.

These semi-structured interviews yielded eight categories defining surgical ergonomics, each containing comments, advice, metrics, and interconnected visualisations. Moreover, a comprehensive list of metrics was established to quantify surgical ergonomics. These metrics were also linked to visualisations. All results represent a significant advancement in defining ergonomic posture in surgery.