Design and Development of an Occupational Ergonomic Application to support Low Back Pain Risk Assessment

Abstract

A better designed work place can prevent up to one-third of the back injuries by enhancing occupational safety. Backster™, a biomechanics-training aide, allowed for experiential ergonomics training in a more engaging way. A companion web application to Backster™ would be a versatile assessment tool that can be utilized independently of the prototype.

The Backster™ web application allows for the personalization of results while providing quick assessments of low back pain risk during lifting tasks. The vision for the Backster™ is to support a user to quickly and easily adjust the lifting and personal parameters such as gender, height, weight, load, and posture. Additionally, Backster™ also enables the ergonomist to assess the capabilities of the whole class in terms of performing lifting tasks under specific set of conditions. The application supports data visualization to increase ease of analysis.