Iranian Journal of Ergonomics

A ccording to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, musculoskeletal disorders consist of a group of structures including nerves, tendons, muscles, and supporting structures such as the intervertebral discs. The range of these disorders is wide. It ranges from mild symptoms to severe and chronic pain and even debilitating conditions; for example, carpal tunnel syndrome and neck and back pain syndrome [1]. Annually, a percentage of the profits from the sale of goods and services by producers are spent on costs of musculoskeletal disorders due to non-compliance with ergonomic conditions. These costs are not favorable for organizations and employees and in most cases’ ergonomic risk factors affect the quality of life of employees.

 

The present field study was conducted as a census on 193 workers with medical records in one of the domestic automotive industries on December 2018. The highest prevalence of musculoskeletal disorders belonged to 16 workers, so their workstations were analyzed. Nordic questionnaire and interviews with workers were the tools of data collection. Each of the selected workstations were analyzed with OWAS method after taking photos and videos from different jobs.

The results showed that three work stations from the viewpoint of Action Categories are at the level of three, three work stations at the level of two and one station at the level of one; then the costs of incidence and treatment and related actions due to establishing ergonomic conditions were calculated.
 

Table 1. Demographic characteristics of selected workers (number = 16 people)

In this study, due to the limitations of not having access to cost-related information, limited variables could be extracted, which resulted in a very small sum of the calculated costs compared to the high costs of these disorders for workers and their families. Unfortunately, no internal research has been done on the costs of musculoskeletal disorders, and foreign research is not comparable or arguable compared to Iran due to differences in financial and insurance systems in those countries.
The results of the research showed that the cost of 1,470,200,000 Rials (in case of making a dashboard manipulator inside the company) in order to create ergonomic conditions in the 7 workstations examined instead of the cost of musculoskeletal disorders at a cost of 1,497,232,270 Rials is associated with economic efficiency.
A total of 464 working days lost due to the absence of experienced workers in 7 important workstations most likely had a negative impact on the quality of product assembly and productivity, the cost of which could not be calculated due to the lack of relevant information. It is worth mentioning that 4 out of 7 workstations surveyed were very safe in terms of quality. Failure to install the bolts on the tires, brake pedal connections, and fuel system will not only cause significant costs to the automaker, but will also result in fatalities for users. In this case, the company will incur exorbitant costs of grievances and ransom, and ultimately, its credibility will decline. Due to the impossibility of calculating the costs related to the mentioned cases, 90,012,060 Rials of indirect costs are very small compared with the direct costs.

Workstations analysis, preventive actions and also designing a process to reduce the musculoskeletal abnormalities of the staff, which results in ergonomic conditions, compared with the cost of incidence and treatment of musculoskeletal complications is cost-effective for this automotive industry.
 

The authors thank all those who helped them write this article.

 

The authors declared no conflict of interest.