Work related upper limb disorder assessment among non-clinical healthcare workers at Hospital Tengku Ampuan Afzan /Mohd Hafifi Zulkipli

The ergonomic issues not really are understood by the people in Malaysia because of lack of information and awareness especially at the workplace. The employers and employees both overlooked at the musculoskeletal disorder, one of the ergonomic health effects at the workplaces. The healthcare workers both clinical and non-clinical workers are exposed to the ergonomic hazards such as awkward postures, repetitive motion and overload of lifting objects. The study conducted to assess the upper limb disorder risk among the Radicare non-clinical health care workers at the Radicare, Hospital Tengku Ampuan Afzan and its relation with the health effect present, particularly those related to musculoskeletal disorder. Rapid Upper Limb Assessment (RULA) is the vital tool in the study to determine the risk level of the working posture.
The Modified Standardized Nordic Musculoskeletal Disorder Questionnaire used to find out the body part affected with the musculoskeletal disorder (MSD) among the workers within 7 days. Neck is the most affected body part with MSD within 7 days with 84.1 % had experienced because most of the workers use their neck to look down during working. Mean for RULA scores among the workers is 5.45, Action Level 3 or
Medium Risk which need to "further investigation and work posture need to be change soon". There was significant correlation between work types and RULA scores, 0.049, p-value less than 0.05 using Spearman's correlation test. There was a significant association between work type of clinical waste with the body part affected, low back, 0.001, p-value less than 0.05 using the chi-square association test. The work related
upper limb disorder assessment among the Radicare, non-clinical health care workers can be concluded that the workers are- exposed to the ergonomic hazards such as repetitive motion and awkward postures. The workers risk to the work related upper limb disorder such as low back pain and neckache.