Work place design recommendations for the pregnant worker

Abstract

In many workplaces and nations, changing economic conditions and social perceptions have resulted in more pregnant women staying in the work force, often to full term. The failure to recognize the special ergonomic needs of the pregnant worker results in less than efficient work performance and possibly, a health threat to the baby. A number of ergonomic risk factors in the workplace need to be addressed to ensure the health of the pregnant worker and to ensure her greatest productivity. This paper describes the most commonly identified ergonomic risk factors for pregnancy and where possible makes design recommendations for these factors that should allow the normal, healthy pregnant worker to continue to work with a minimum of risk and greatest work efficiency.

Relevance to industry

The pregnant worker is increasingly common in today's workplaces. This paper presents general design recommendations to help ensure that the pregnant worker can still perform her job safely and efficiently.

Introduction

As the percentage of females in the workforce increases, a realistic recognition of the unique needs of the pregnant worker is finally beginning to emerge. Recognition of the physical and physiological changes that occur with pregnancy and how they influence work efficiency is particularly important, for in many industries females comprise the majority of the moderate to high-skill positions, and thus represent a significant economic aspect of production which cannot always be easily or rapidly replaced. Despite legally mandated pregnancy and family leave legislation in most developed countries, there is an increasing number of women who are staying on the job well into pregnancy. There is a clear need to understand and recognize ergonomic limits present during pregnancy that may interfere with the health, safety and productivity of the pregnant worker, and design or adjust the work environment and tasks accordingly.

How industry responds to this changing workforce determines in great measure, the type of economic impact that pregnancy has on the company. Historical responses to the pregnant worker have ranged from laying her off to trying to accommodate her by transfer after the pregnancy becomes advanced. The more cost-effective response to the pregnant worker is to develop workstations and tasks beforehand that consider the physiological and anatomical changes that occur during pregnancy, and as the worker's pregnancy advances, move her into these modified workstations and job assignments as necessary.

As with most proactive design activities, the initial costs are greater. However, over the long run, this approach is more cost effective than waiting to respond until a pregnancy occurs, the worker wishes to stay with her job, the task or job has to be redesigned or the worker transferred and possibly, retrained. This paper discusses some of the primary ergonomic design issues for both proactive design and planning and in reactive re-design. No attempt is made to provide exact design criteria beyond extreme limits as there is too little accurate data. Instead, the most critical ergonomic risk factors are identified, and where possible, recommendations for each of these risk factors is described.