Preplacement worker testing and selection considerations.

Abstract

Except for obvious physical, mental or psychological limitations, most of the pre-employment testing and selection of workers has been to avoid problems related to the back. Until recently, prevention strategies for back problems have been based on retrospective data from surveys of limited scope and small population size. As Stover Snook stated at the NIAMMD conference (NIH symposium) in December of 1980 in Florida, ‘Most studies of low back pain are small sample, short-term, and retrospective studies done without control groups. The greatest need … is for a long-term, controlled longitudinal study that … controls the many variables involved in low back pain … Nevertheless we can approach the ideal experiment with large samples, control groups, good experimental design, adequate statistical treatment, and sufficient funds and time to complete the study’. Unfortunately, few such prospective studies have been conducted The University of Washington in cooperation with The Boeing Company and NIOSH is presently involved in the largest multifactorial study with the longest follow-up to date as it relates to industrial back injuries. So far, the study complements previous efforts and includes prospective data that have not previ­ously been reported, such as social, psychological, specifics of job task, and injury data, not only for reported back injuries, but most importantly for chronic back pain disability. This paper presents some preliminary findings of the study.