Grant: CIHR Café Scientifique Program

Work-related musculoskeletal disorders (WMSD) are the most commonly reported injuries among employees working in developed countries. Creating interventions to deal with WMSD is challenging because work is comprised of multi-level interaction between such factors as: organizational culture, production requirements, interactions with others, capacities of individual employees, and available tools and training. Gathering knowledge about all these factors and interactions and working within the organizational culture and context is difficult for external practitioners. These realities are fuelling growing interest in participatory ergonomics (PE) among ergonomists, industry, and labour. The SafetyNet Centre for Occupational Health and Safety Research (Memorial University) was funded by a CIHR Knowledge to Action grant to design, implement, and evaluate a series of tools designed for use by facilitating ergonomists interested in implementing an Ergo-Team approach to PE. The resulting toolkit is called "A Team Effort: How to Implement an Ergo-Team Approach to Participatory Ergonomics." It includes a promotional video, a guide written for facilitating ergonomists based on a stepwise approach to implementing an Ergo-Team, and a training workbook including sets of activities designed to help train Ergo-Team members. Two proposed Café Scientifiques, to be held in both St. John's, NL and Edmonton, AB, will be a core part of the launch of the toolkit and will 1) promote awareness of the PE approach; 2) introduce and begin distribution of the toolkit; 3) create a forum for professionals, industrial stakeholders, researchers, and interested members of the public to publicly reflect about the tools and the approach; and, 4) use feedback from the Café Scientifique to inform strategies for promoting awareness of the online version of the toolkit.