Preventing Lower Back Injuries in Construction (1810 words)

Write a research paper on the topic of preventing lower back injuries in construction. This is a graduate level class in Safety and Accident Prevention at the job site.

The instructions for this paper are as follows:

Prepare a well-organized and thoughtful five to seven-page research paper that is required to have at least five references and may include Internet sources, books, and professional journals or other resources related to the profession, title page, reference page and be written in APA format (the title and reference a pages are not included in the required paper length). There must be an introduction and conclusion section in the paper, and label both sections as such.

This material may consist of step-by-step explanations on how to solve a problem or examples of proper writing, including the use of citations, references, bibliographies, and formatting. This material is made available for the sole purpose of studying and learning - misuse is strictly forbidden.

Introduction
That lower back injury is commonly prevalent among construction workers hardly surprises – the extent of the incidence and severity of the problem is, however, staggering. In this brief discussion, I first present a review of some of the academic literature that addresses the scope and nature of the problem; some of the details presented, such as the high incidence of such injury in young, apprentice construction workers, and the fact that nursing is construction’s primary back injury counterpart for women, are worthy of note and feature prominently. The second section of the paper is geared toward a presentation of preventative ‘solutions’ to the problem – with emphasis on the mindset of smart ergonomic engineering and smart administration and training.
The Problem (a mini-review of the literature)
Some context for the problem of lower back injury and pain in the construction-worker population is warranted. The problem of back pain suffered by the US workforce as a whole is widespread and chronic. A 1995 article in the American Journal of Industrial Medicine, Back pain among workers in the United States: National estimates and workers at high risk (Guo et al., 1995) documented that approximately twenty-five per cent of workers’ compensation claims in the US were due to back pain....