Comparison of ten widely-use ergonomic risk assessment tools based on evaluations of various manual materials handling activities
File(s)
Accepted version
Author(s)
Zargarzadeh, Sadra
Bahramian, Mohammadreza
Mohseni, Mahdi
Arjmand, Navid
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Ergonomic risk assessment tools are commonly used to evaluate the risk of musculoskeletal injuries during manual material handling (MMH) activities. This study aimed to compare and evaluate the performance of ten widely-used ergonomic risk assessment tools (REBA, RULA, QEC, NIOSH, WISHA, ManTRA, MAC, Washington state, ACGIH-TLV, and Snook’s tables) in assessing risk of injury to workers during various lifting, lowering, pulling, pushing, carrying, and prolonged static activities. Twenty-one different MMH activities including one- and two-handed, stoop/squat, symmetric/asymmetric tasks with various hand-load horizontal and vertical positions, weights, vibration, and task frequencies were assessed using the foregoing ten ergonomic risk assessment tools. A unique risk level classification was introduced to compare the outcomes of these tools. For a given MMH activity, the estimated levels of risk by different tools were found to be more consistent between the tools for high- and low-demanding tasks, and less consistent and in some cases contradictory for moderately-demanding tasks. RULA, ACGIH TLV, REBA, and QEC were the most and MAC and WISHA were the least conservative tools in their assessments. Comparison of these risk assessment tools revealed their similarities/dissimilarities and strengths/limitations thereby providing users with a comprehensive guideline for proper selection of these tools in practical applications.
Date Issued
2024-07-24
Date Acceptance
2024-07-01
Citation
Scientia Iranica: international journal of science and technology, 2024
ISSN
1026-3098
Publisher
Elsevier
Journal / Book Title
Scientia Iranica: international journal of science and technology
Copyright Statement
© Sharif University of Technology. Scientia Iranica is a nonprofit scientific and engineering venue managed by Sharif University of Technology that provides engineers and scientists with high-quality articles. While the copyright holder is Sharif University of Technology, under this Open Access journal, peer-reviewed accepted papers are immediately available online, with no charges for access and no restrictions on subsequent redistribution or use, as long as the authors(s) and source are cited, as specified by the Attribution Creative Commons BY License (https://creativecommons.org/share-your-work/licensing-examples/).
License URL
Identifier
http://dx.doi.org/10.24200/sci.2024.63530.8451
Publication Status
Published online
Date Publish Online
2024-07-24