Abstract
While it plays a vital role in a country’s economic development, port operations host a wide spectrum of health problems and work-related diseases. This study aimed at determining the prevalence, severity, and significant risk factors that contribute to the occurrence of work-related musculoskeletal disorders among stevedores in a Philippine break-bulk port terminal. The stevedores were asked to identify the work-related musculoskeletal symptoms they had experienced over the last three months. In this cross-sectional study, the results showed that self-reported prevalence and severity of work-related musculoskeletal symptoms were significantly higher in the upper and lower back, shoulder, and forearm regions. Some of the identified risk factors associated with the severity of musculoskeletal symptoms are age, work experience, number of working days per week, vessel work assignment, type of steel commodity, level of job satisfaction, and perceived job security among others, suggesting that the etiology of this condition is multifaceted.
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Acknowledgement
The authors would like to acknowledge the funding support from the Engineering Research and Development for Technology (ERDT), Department of Science and Technology (DOST), Philippines. Special thanks to Jairus Gogorza, Bryan Gayagoy, Kenneth Soldevilla, James Lomeda, Bannie Alcantara, and Michelle Estrada for their significant contribution in data collection.
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Sedilla, K., Matias, A. (2018). Prevalence, Severity, and Risk Factors of Work-Related Musculoskeletal Disorders Among Stevedores in a Philippine Break-Bulk Port Terminal. In: Freund, L., Cellary, W. (eds) Advances in The Human Side of Service Engineering. AHFE 2017. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 601. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-60486-2_9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-60486-2_9
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