Reduced Work Pace in a Poultry Slaughterhouse

Slaughterhouse workers are often exposed to many biomechanical risk factors that contribute to the development of upper-limb work-related musculoskeletal disorders (UL-WMSD). Therefore, the aim of this study was to evaluate the risks in relation to repetitive movements of the upper limbs in a poultry slaughterhouse, as well as analyze the effects of a reduced work pace on the risk levels. The study was conducted in a slaughterhouse with 1,500 workers, who were divided into two shifts, where 150,000 chickens were slaughtered daily. The OCRA checklist was implemented to assess 10% of the total workforce. The Student t-test was applied to examine the difference between the risks of both sides of the body (p ≤ 0.05). The 14 analyzed work tasks were from the sectors: cutting (8), packing (5) and reception (1). The workers performed 72.8 ± 15.3 actions per minute (10/10 points on the OCRA scale). The average score of the OCRA checklist was 23.4 ± 4.4 (high risk). The scores for the right upper limb (23.1 ± 4.8 - high risk) were not significantly different (p = 0.175) than the left (21.8 ± 5.2 - moderate risk). Considering the five risk categories of the OCRA method, 10 tasks were deemed high risk (71%) and 4 presented moderate risk (29%). By conducting simulations, it was possible to reduce the risk to a very low level in 13 of the 14 tasks by only decreasing the work pace (−56.9 ± 10.4%). In this way, simulations of a reduced work pace showed the effectiveness of this organizational measure in lowering the risk of UL-WMSD.