The level of visual and musculoskeletal disorders among office workers in Palestine (full text in pdf)
Yahya Saleh 1, a
Ramiz Assaf 2, b
1
Industrial Engineering Department, An-Najah National University, P.O.Box 7, Nablus, Palestine
2 Industrial Engineering Department, University of Business and Technology, Jeddah 21361, Kingdom of
SAUDIA ARABIA
a ysaleh@najah.edu
b r.assaf@ubt.edu.sa
Abstract Visual and Musculoskeletal Disorders (VMSD) are one of the occupational diseases prevalent
among office workers in the globe. Many studies have been devoted to examine such disorders in developed
countries. However, few studies have recently been initiated in developing countries. Among them is this study
which aims to assess the prevalence of VMSDs among office workers in Palestine. To this end, a self-reporting
questionnaire was designed and distributed to 501 respondents from office workers working in public and
private organizations in West Bank, Palestine. The collected data were statistically analyzed performing,
ANOVA and Multiple Linear Regression. The results showed that about 62.5% of the sampled workers
suffered from the development of at least one VMSD symptom, and about 17% indicated they have one
permanent symptom. Besides, gender and age of office workers showed significant statistical differences in the
prevalence of VMSD’s symptoms. The results of the MLR showed significance in modeling the VMSD’s
symptoms prevalence. The findings of this study could help the relevant stakeholders in taking engineering
and administrative interventions to alleviate the adverse effects of VMSD on office workers’ occupational
health, safety and job performance.
Keywords: Office workers; musculoskeletal disorders; visual disorders; ergonomics; multiple linear
regression.