The repair and maintenance of electrical power lines involves awkward postures, which are known risk factors for developing musculoskeletal disorders. The aim of the present study was to quantify postures and movements of upper arm, head, upper back and neck in the main tasks performed by line workers. Posture of twelve right-handed line workers was recorded by inclinometry and presented as percentiles of angular and angular velocity distributions. All tasks involved considerable upper-arm elevation, ranging from 73° to 115° for the 90th percentile. Upper-arm elevation showed significant differences between tasks, but no consistent differences between right and left sides. Regarding velocity, the right arm presented higher levels than the left arm. All tasks required significant extension of head, upper back and neck, ranging from 7° to 67° for head (10th percentile). All tasks, except the one performed with a continuous extension, also involved pronounced flexion, ranging from 33° to 60° for the head (90th percentile). Work which required highly elevated arms also required significant head extension (r2=0.56). Awkward postures of upper arms, head, upper back and neck were identified by inclinometry, demonstrating the need for preventative interventions to reduce musculoskeletal disorders among line workers.

This study compared neck range of movement recording using three different methods goniometers (EGM), inclinometers (INC) and a three-dimensional video analysis system (IMG) in simultaneous and synchronized data collection. Twelve females performed neck flexion-extension, lateral flexion, rotation and circumduction. The differences between EGM, INC, and IMG were calculated sample by sample. For flexion-extension movement, IMG underestimated the amplitude by 13%; moreover, EGM showed a crosstalk of about 20% for lateral flexion and rotation axes. In lateral flexion movement, all systems showed similar amplitude and the inter-system differences were moderate (4-7%). For rotation movement, EGM showed a high crosstalk (13%) for flexion-extension axis. During the circumduction movement, IMG underestimated the amplitude of flexion-extension movements by about 11%, and the inter-system differences were high (about 17%) except for INC-IMG regarding lateral flexion (7%) and EGM-INC regarding flexion-extension (10%). For application in workplace, INC presents good results compared to IMG and EGM though INC cannot record rotation. EGM should be improved in order to reduce its crosstalk errors and allow recording of the full neck range of movement. Due to non-optimal positioning of the cameras for recording flexion-extension, IMG underestimated the amplitude of these movements.