Work related low back pain, psychosocial, physical and individual risk factors among nurses in emergency care unit

Abstract

Background

Work-related Low back Pain (WR-LBP) represents an important impact on the health and economic burden of workers worldwide. The wide range of risk factors have been evaluated on nurses, however, there is limited understanding of the contributions of an individual, physical and psychosocial factors with work-related low back pain among nurses in Emergency Care Unit (ECU). The aim of this study was to understand the potential risk factors of WR-LBP among ECU nurses.

Methods

This was a cross-sectional survey of healthcare workers in ECU at seven Hospitals in Manado. Questionnaires were distributed to assess the demographics, individual lifestyle and physical job characteristics, psychosocial, and self-reported low back pain. The associations between risk factors and WR-LBP were determined using multivariate logistic analysis.

Results

In total, 162 nurses in ECU participated in this research (81% response rate). A high proportion of nurses (92%) had experienced Work related – Musculoskeletal Disorder (WR-MSD) in the last 12 months, and 77% reported had experienced WR-LBP within the previous 12 months. WR-LBP was associated with older age (p = 0.001), being government officers (p = 0.002), more than 5 years of employment status (p = 0.002), has additional work (p = 0.05), psychosocial effort (p = 0.003), the total score of awkward position (0.000). Most of the work awkward positions measured in this study. The multivariate analysis confirmed that age (OR = 1.14, 95%CI 1.05–1.23), psychosocial effort (OR = 1.493, 95%CI 1.08–2.07), and awkward position total score (OR = 1.13, 95%CI 1.07–1.19) were significantly associated with WR-LBP.

Conclusions

This study revealed that individual, physical and psychosocial risk factors were important for work-related low back pain among nurses in ECU, especially the physical effort. It is suggested to increase attention to nurses’ health and safety, in ECU. The physical load factors should be addressed when designing a prevention method for nurses in ECU.