# Prevalence and Exposure to Ergonomic Risk Factors among Crop Farmers in Nigeria
## 4 Discussion
Previous evidence has highlighted agricultural musculoskeletal injuries to include pain in the back, neck, tenosynovitis (inflammation of the wrist tendon), bursitis (inflammation of the shoulder joint fluid sac (bursa), and osteoarthritis of the knee (degeneration of the knee joint cartilage) are common among agricultural workers [1; 2; 3; 4; 5; 6; 7; 8; 9; 10; 11; 12; 13; 14; 15; 16; 17; 18; 19; 20; 21; 22; 23; 24]. The findings from our study showed that 96% reported shoulder pain as an ergonomic injury experienced during farming operations. We found that wrist/hands injury prevalence was 43% as reported by respondents. We found 85% prevalence in lower back pain and 82% prevalence in upper back pain as reported by farmers. The prevalence of shoulder pain and back pain among respondents were found to be high. This implied that ergonomic injuries in the shoulder, back, and neck were prominent among the respondents. This high prevalence may be attributed to manual operations which includes bad postures and heavy load lifting among farmers. This finding was corroborated by [PERSON] and [PERSON] who reported shoulder pain was found to be greater in farming (14%) than either other manual labour 9.7% or non-manual labour 7.1% jobs [25]. Additionally, [PERSON] et al. [26] interviewed 16,113 Korean farmers concerning their agricultural characteristics, demographic profiles, and self-reported musculoskeletal discomfort with the use of specific questionnaires. Participants reported pain in the back (26.9%), lower extremities (19.62%), and on the regions of neck or muscles. Other studies have shown that upper extremity injuries have plagued dairy farmers with 27% of all injuries and tobacco farmers with 25% [27]. A study by [PERSON] [15] reported that ergonomics risks are so common among experienced farmers that most of them perceived it as an inevitable consequence of farm labour. Previous research by the New York Centre for Agricultural Medicine and Health (NYCAMH) suggests that back, neck, and shoulder strain is a common problem among farmworkers [28]. The study by [PERSON] et al. [29] also reported that weeding and handling of heavy loads and prolonged work activities are known as the main risk factors of musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) in crop production. In their study, they found that farmers reported work-related musculoskeletal disorder (WMSD) most often in conjunction with the equipment (e.g., climbing up/down equipment; equipment coupling; and equipment operation). Farmworkers have been reported to be experiencing increased WMSD with higher rates of knee and hip arthritis identified in farmers in stanchion dairies; tobacco topping (e.g., shoulder WMSD; forearm and wrist tendintis); tobacco leaf harvesting and curing barn work (e.g., neck, shoulder, back, and lower extremity WMSD); sweet potato harvesting (e.g., neck, shoulder, back, and lower extremity WMSD; and fingernail tearing); cucumber harvesting (e.g., neck, shoulder, back, and lower extremity WMSD); and watermelon harvesting (e.g., neck, shoulder, and upper extremity WMSD) [30]. [PERSON] et al. [31] found in their study that disorders of muscles, bone, and joints as the most common occupational-health issues1. This is similar to the findings by [PERSON] and [PERSON], who observed about 64% of chronic musculoskeletal injuries among workers [32]. [PERSON] et al., assessed crop farmers' health-related hazards and found that about 83.8% of the respondents experienced general body pain which forced farmers to take days off from the farm [33]. Footnote 1: [[https://www.sds.org/](https://www.sds.org/)]([https://www.sds.org/](https://www.sds.org/))  
As shown in Table 3, further findings from our study on the frequency of the self-reported ergonomic related body pain showed that about (29%) of the farmers experienced neck pain twice a week, 52% had shoulder pain twice a week, elbow and wrist/hand pain was reported twice a week by 28% of the respondents. Upper and lower back pain was reported twice a week by 43% and 35%, respectively.