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Abstract
Unrelieved pressure on load-bearing muscle tissues of humans can produce pressure ulcers. In a seated upright posture, the highest pressures occur inferior to the ischial tuberosities (ITs). Moreover, the vibration can initiate the development of pressure ulcer. Therefore, the seat cushion is not only used to lower the maximum seating pressure on buttocks but also minimize the transmission of vibration to human body. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of varying vertical vibration frequencies on seat-interface contact pressure during sitting on three different seat cushions by using a finite element modeling approach. A simplified two-dimensional human buttock-thigh model was developed to simulate the mechanical response of the muscle of buttocks and thigh under vertical vibration. Static and vibrational loads with five different frequencies of 0.1, 1, 10, 30 and 50 Hz and the same amplitude of 3 mm were applied to different seat cushions. The result showed that the “SAF 6060” seat cushion with both hyperelastic and viscoelastic behaviors could be effective in reducing the amplitude of varying maximum contact pressure, especially for the frequency of 10-20 Hz. This method could help in design of seat cushions with appropriate material properties and shape so as to reduce vibrations transmitted to human body at a certain frequency range.
Highlights
Static seating comfort is important for drivers and wheelchair users
For drivers and wheelchair users who have sat for a long time, they could be associated with an increased risk of pressure ulcers [2]
As the location B is under the ichial tuberosities (IT), minimizing the contact pressure at this location means minimizing the stress under ischial tuberosities (ITs)
Summary
Static seating comfort is important for drivers and wheelchair users. Experimental methods could find the interface pressure between human body and seat. It could not provide the information about subcutaneous stress and deformations of soft tissues. For drivers and wheelchair users who have sat for a long time, they could be associated with an increased risk of pressure ulcers [2]. Ragan et al determined the effects of the thickness of polymer foam wheelchair cushions on subcutaneous pressures during seating by using a finite element approach [8]. It was found that seat-interface pressures were a good indicator for reducing the subcutaneous stress
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