title: [Comparative assessment of the risk of handling of objects with an analysis protocol and the use of digital human models].
abstract: In this work the Authors propose a methodology based on the use of an ergonomic software in alternative to the traditional methods to evaluate muscular-skeletal diseases caused by incongruous postures or conditions of mechanical overload. This methodology allows to simulate, in a virtual environment, both a workplace and a digital human model whose behaviours are similar, from a kinematical and a dynamical point of view, to that ones of a real person. Through the simulation in a virtual environment of an operation of Manual Material Handling (MMH) in a pharmaceutics industry, the Authors have evaluated, in real time, the strengths and the reaction-moments in the axial, sagittal and lateral plane on the L4 and L5 lumbar vertebras and on the shoulder of the workers. In the work the single movements carried out by the operator are analysed using manikins of different percentiles. The results are compared with the ones coming from the use of the traditional methods to evaluate muscular skeletal disease.
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Progettazione e Gestione Industriale, Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II, Italy. digironi@unina.it
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Di Gironimo
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Patalano
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Liotti
authors.forename: U
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Conserva
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Paruccini
mesh_terms: D006801:Humans; D017770:Lifting; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D009140:Musculoskeletal Diseases / Q000209:etiology*; D009784:Occupational Diseases / Q000209:etiology*; D012307:Risk Factors