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Book details
  • Genre:REFERENCE
  • SubGenre:General
  • Language:English
  • Pages:632
  • eBook ISBN:9782896317257

Ergonomic Intervention

by Marie St-Vincent , Nicole Vézina, Marie Bellemare, Denys Denis, Élise Ledoux and Daniel Imbeau

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Overview

This eBook is intended primarily for ergonomists in training, but it will also be of benefit to all ergonomists, whether novice or experienced. It was designed as a practical guide for use in academic ergonomics courses. Since it explains the practice of ergonomic intervention, the eBook should also be useful to occupational health and safety (OHS) professionals, as well as to various organization stakeholders. Other professionals involved in designing work situations, such as engineers, architects, information technology specialists and human resources officers, may also find it interesting to see how ergonomics fits in with what they do. Ergonomic Intervention will help advance the field, improve the training of future ergonomists and contribute to making the practice of ergonomics better known and understood.

Description

This is a reference book on ergonomic intervention methodology. What makes it distinctive is its focus on the actual intervention process, the “how to” of ergonomics in action. Although it also lays out the theoretical foundations, its primary goal is to formalize what Quebec researchers and practitioners do to transform work situations with respect to current issues (musculoskeletal disorders [MSDs], lean production systems, service relationships, etc.). The book gives English-speaking readers a unique opportunity to learn about the concepts and methods of ergonomic intervention in the French-speaking world, as they have been adapted to the Quebec context, which lies on the boundary between the French-speaking and English-speaking ways of doing things. The approach described revolves around activity analysis, a concept that has been extensively formalized by French ergonomists. It is quite different from an approach that concentrates on applying standards or solely on analysing risk factors. Part I of the book is devoted to the theoretical foundations of ergonomic intervention. The first chapter sets out a model of the work situation focusing on the individual. This provides a basis for work activity analysis. The second chapter describes an intervention model that outlines the various stages of ergonomic intervention. Part II forms the core of the book. Each chapter examines a specific stage in the ergonomic intervention process: analysis of the intervention request, initial investigation, analysis of the work situation, formulation of a preliminary diagnosis, drafting of an action plan, and design of transformation plans. The last chapter deals with cases where further investigation is required to fully understand the work activity. Part III, which is unique for this kind of publication, concentrates on some concrete aspects of an ergonomist’s practice. Based essentially on interviews conducted with practitioners active in a variety of settings, Chapter 9 is devoted to the characteristics of practice, the skills ergonomists must develop and the strategies they use in different contexts. The chapter anchors the book in the realities of everyday ergonomics and offers all kinds of advice and ideas about the work that ergonomists do. To make the book more practical, the appendixes contain a series of tools that ergonomists regularly use: context analysis form, interview questions, investigation questionnaires, logbook, etc. How to carry out an ergonomic intervention is not self-evident. It’s something that has to be learned and that’s the theme of this book: how to analyse actual work activity, develop good design and transformation guidelines, and promote their implementation, taking into account the specific context of each workplace.

About the author

This book is the work of a group of six researchers, most of whom also teach ergonomics:

  1. MARIE ST-VINCENT, PhD in physiology, postdoctorate in ergonomics,
  2. NICOLE VÉZINA, PhD in ergonomics. Professor in the Department of Kinanthropology at the Université du Québec à Montréal,
  3. MARIE BELLEMARE, PhD in ergonomics. Associate professor in the Department of Industrial Relations at Université Laval in Quebec City,
  4. DENYS DENIS, PhD in ergonomics. Researcher at the IRSST and associate professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at the Université du Québec à Montréal,
  5. ÉLISE LEDOUX, PhD in ergonomics. Researcher at the IRSST and associate professor in the Department of Kinanthropology at the Université du Québec à Montréal and in the Department of Industrial Relations at Université Laval in Quebec City
  6. DANIEL IMBEAU, Eng., PhD. Professor in the Department of Mathematics and Industrial Engineering at École Polytechnique de Montréal.