Massage & Bodywork

May/June 2012

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appear to be the case. Researchers found a very high rate of workers' compensation claim denial for these workers.3 In addition, many do not report injuries that incur for numerous reasons, including fear of reprisal from management, mandatory drug testing after the injury, and fear of lost work time while waiting for the claim to be processed. SPECIFIC ASPECTS OF INJURY Research on occupational disorders in housekeeping workers points to a very high incidence of musculoskeletal injury.4 Consider the biomechanics of cleaning a single hotel room, then multiply that by the dozens of individual rooms housekeeping personnel must clean every day. One study that looked at the awkward positions adopted by housekeeping workers in the midst of their daily workload reported, "The prevalence of musculoskeletal pain was highest in participants who worked with the back in an awkward posture (65 percent), followed by employees who worked with their arms and neck in an awkward posture, respectively (64 percent). Injury rates appear correlated not only with high loads and repetitive motion, but performing these same activities with the body in an awkward position."5 INJURY TO THE LOW BACK Following are specific activities that are frequent causes of the musculoskeletal disorders affecting housekeeping workers. Most of us don't think twice about musculoskeletal strain when making our bed, but making multiple beds in a day leads to biomechanical challenges that incite musculoskeletal injury. Many hotels have moved to larger and thicker luxury mattresses. That means when a housekeeping worker has to lift the mattress to tuck sheets in, it is a much heavier load to lift. She is also most likely bending while attempting to lift the mattress. In addition, because she is frequently making king-size beds, reaching across this much larger bed to adjust the bedding puts a much higher stress load on her low back (Image 1). Researchers performed a comprehensive study on the biomechanical challenges of housekeeping labor and found significant musculoskeletal strain associated with the bedmaking activities: "A new analysis ... demonstrates that the housekeeping job—including bedmaking task—has a 75 percent probability of yielding a high injury rate. This result is worse than that for any of the 20 manufacturing jobs which were also studied. Likewise, a new analysis of the bedmaking task on a luxury bed showed that bedmaking alone (apart from other room- 2 cleaning tasks) exceeded the safe lifting limit recommended by the US National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health."6 Numerous biomechanical studies have shown that working with force loads at arm's length away from the torso, while the back is bent, places undue stress on the lumbar region. The anatomical structure of the low back is ideally designed to help maintain the upright torso and move the body in various positions, but not necessarily to frequently move heavy loads. It wouldn't be so bad if housekeeping workers only did this a couple of times during the day, but it is a routine part of the daily workload. paraspinal muscles The paraspinal muscles are designed to help keep the torso upright, but are easily overwhelmed with the high force loads required by housekeeping labor.3D anatomy images. Copyright of Primal Pictures Ltd. www.primalpictures.com. Celebrate ABMP's 25th anniversary and you may win a refund on your membership. ABMP.com. 105

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