RSI threatens to become leading work-related illness

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Repetitive strain injury (RSI) seems to be affecting increasing numbers of Dutch employees. Research indicates that in 1999 nearly 30% of the workforce experienced RSI complaints. In 1998, the Dutch Trade Union Federation (FNV) made the illness the subject of an information campaign and secondary preventative measures.

"Repetitive strain injury" (RSI) is a blanket term for a number of injuries such as a painfully stiff neck or tense shoulders, elbow pain, underarm pain or soreness in the wrists and fingers. A TNO Arbeid research study conducted in 1999 determined that 29% of the Dutch workforce suffer from one or more of these complaints (22% of men, 44% of women). Neck and shoulder problems are the most prevalent, and pain in the underarm area, wrists and fingers, referred to in the Netherlands as "mouse arm", affects 10% of the workforce. Approximately 7% of the workforce cite two or more of the identified complaints. The number of employees unable to work as a result of RSI is estimated at a staggering 3,000 each year.

Although RSI is usually associated with the dynamic overload of muscles, joints and nerves as a result of repetitive labour, it can also occur due to lack of movement associated with sedentary work and static overload as a result of working with a sustained posture for extended periods of time. In addition to these leading causes, important secondary risk factors identified include long work duration (overtime), lack of breaks and high levels of pressure on the job.

According to a Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment study, Dutch employees are relatively more frequently exposed to these risk factors: the number of employees who work with sustained posture is about 40% (42% of men, 44% of women), and 40% of the workforce regularly perform repetitive manual labour. The figure for younger employees who perform repetitive labour is even higher at 50%. Young employees suffer relatively more often from RSI.

The Netherlands also rates poorly in comparison with other European countries according to the Second European survey on working conditions, conducted in 1996 by the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions. Repetitive and short-cycle labour occurs somewhat more frequently in the Netherlands than the average for EU countries. For one of the most important secondary risk factors, the pace of work, the Netherlands actually leads Europe with an incidence of 70% as opposed to the 54% average. Dutch employees also have relatively little say on their break times, with 43% exerting no influence on breaks compared to the 37% average.

The growing amount of attention focused on RSI is due in part to a number of activities conducted by the Dutch Trade Union Federation (Federatie Nederlandse Vakbeweging, FNV), the Netherlands' largest union confederation. In 1998, FNV launched a "quality of labour" campaign which included RSI and on-the-job pressure and stress as two of its most important topics. A study on the prevention of RSI was conducted in cooperation with TNO Arbeid within the framework of the campaign. FNV also organised an educational campaign in a number of sectors where the majority of work takes place in front of computer monitors (eg the service sector and the information and communications technology (ICT) sector). Another FNV project was the development of a so-called "screen tachometer" to register the number of keystrokes and mouse movements performed by an employee during the working day. The device also calculates the intensity of screen work and the RSI risk employees face, according to the recorded labour intensity. A huge market exists for the screen tachometer. The most recent FNV initiative, funded in part by the Ministry of Social Affairs, is a programme to train members of works councils as RSI consultants to act as specialists in the workplace. So far, project results are unknown as far as concrete figures for decreases in RSI are concerned, but the initiative has also caught on outside the service and ICT sectors.