Musculoskeletal Injuries and Work Stress

By Sue Pennicuik

It's not difficult to see there is a complex and strong relationship between feeling stressed, muscle tension, and the rate and severity of musculoskeletal injuries.

Consider this scenario: Every day a worker is exposed to boring, repetitive work, has to maintain a static, awkward posture, and faces impossible targets in a noisy, crowded work environment. The worker has an erratic shift roster and is on a short-term casual contract and is anxious about having enough money to maintain home and family. A perfect recipe for stress, coupled with no training and awkward loads to shift. Thus muscle stress.

It is often claimed that stress mostly affects those who have positions of responsibility, such as senior executives These positions may be stressful, but the people who actually do suffer the most from stress are the employees who have to do the work that keeps these people well remunerated and able to access their gyms and clubs and personal trainers ie the workers who have little or no control over the working environment and the way the work is done.

(CCh's Australian OHS Magazine; August/September 2002)