Abstract

Perioperative nurses use back tables (BT) to set up instruments for surgeries consisting of a single surface requiring repetitive lifting due to the stacked trays of surgery tools. Since such actions lead to increased physical (heavyweight of trays) and cognitive (reduced visibility and increased access time) demand, the new DinamicOR table (DT) has been developed. DT has the height adjustment capability and can add up to two shelves providing an extra working area for nurses. We evaluated DT vs. BT by conducting a laboratory experiment involving 16 participants, estimating the kinematics, kinetics, and collecting their subjective feedback, NASA task load index (NASA TLX), and ratings of perceived discomfort (RPE), and the time to complete pre-defined tool-finding tasks. Overall, our results indicated that DT was advantageous in terms of kinematics (e.g., smaller maximum shoulder angle, pvalue60% due to the increased working areas (i.e., no need for stacking the surgery tool trays). Therefore, the cumulative physical demand is expected to be smaller for both shoulder and low-back areas. We believe that utilizing the DT over BT, particularly for longer surgeries such as the total knee replacement, would reduce both physical and mental demands and increase the efficiency of nurses to find the surgery tools, which in turn may also reduce the total time of surgery.

Library of Congress Subject Headings

Operating room nurses--Health and hygiene; Tables--Design; Human engineering

Publication Date

2021

Document Type

Thesis

Student Type

Graduate

Degree Name

Industrial and Systems Engineering (MS)

Department, Program, or Center

Industrial and Systems Engineering (KGCOE)

Advisor

Ehsan Rashedi

Advisor/Committee Member

Matthew Marshall

Campus

RIT – Main Campus

Plan Codes

ISEE-MS

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