Physical Discomfort Among Visual Display Terminal Users in a Semiconductor Manufacturing Company: A Study of Prevalence and Relation to Psychosocial and Physical/Ergonomic Factors

Abstract

The associations among several alleged psychosocial and physical/ergonomics risk factors and the visual and musculoskeletal discomforts were assessed in a cross-sectional study of 119 video display terminal (VDT) users in a semiconductor manufacturing company. Cases of discomfort were identified using self-reported discomfort symptoms through questionnaire surveys. Data on individual, physical/ergonomic, and psychosocial aspects were obtained. Multivariate logistic regression models were developed to predict physical discomforts of 11 body areas. The prevalence of upper extremity discomfort found in this semiconductor manufacturing company was 42%, which is similar to the prevalence among VDT users in telecommunication companies and the newspaper industry. Full-time VDT users (data-entry personnel, programming engineers, and CAD engineers) had significantly higher rates of physical discomfort (66%) than part-time VDT users (fabrication engineers) (41%). Physical/ergonomic variables were found more dominant than psychosocial factors for visual and upper extremity discomforts. However, psychosocial variables were the dominant for back and lower extremity discomfort, when compared with the subjectively characterized physical/ergonomic factors. Because both physical/ergonomics variables and psychosocial factors and some of their interactions were associated with visual and musculoskeletal discomfort, integrating psychosocial prevention with physical/ergonomic design improvements is an effective approach to reducing the prevalence of discomfort.