SCARS OF BEING A FARMER: A STUDY ON MUSCULOSKELETAL DISORDERS AMONG A FARMING COMMUNITY OF HARYANA, INDIA

The present study aims to estimate the burden and risk of Musculoskeletal Disorders among Indian farmers in Haryana. A total of 634 participants were recruited in this present study. The Nordic Musculoskeletal Disorders Questionnaire was used to assess the prevalence of Musculoskeletal Disorders. A modified interview schedule was used to assess and identify the major socio-demographic and work-related variables of the participants. Further, the collected data were entered and cleaned using MS Excel. IBM SPSS vs.20 was used for statistical analysis. Description for continuous variables is presented as mean +/- SD and median. Categorical variables are reported as count (N) and percentage (%). T-test and chi-square were used to examine the significant differences between the groups. Binary logistic regression was run to find the risk of socio-demographic variables in Musculoskeletal Disorders. For all statistical analyses, the p-value of <0.05 was considered to be significant. The most common type of MSD in the studied populations was knee pain (48.3%) followed by lower back pain (38.6%) and shoulder pain (29.7%). Female and non-literate participants were found to be at higher risk for the development ofMSDs as compared to their counterparts. Consumption of alcohol and smoking were found to have reduced the risk for the development ofMSDs. Early ergonomic interventions in the form of the use of the right size of tool, good postural adaptation, and updated farm equipment among the farming communities will help them in combating Musculoskeletal Disorders.