Background and Aim: Low back pain is the most common and most costly musculoskeletal disorder among nurses. The studies have showed that ergonomic risk factors are the main cause of back injury. Our aim in this study is to evaluate the incidence of low back pain in nurses with participating in manual handling of patients and determination of its relationship with ergonomic risk level of inpatient wards in a subspecialty hospital in Tehran.

Materials and Methods: Thirty nurses who were active in manual handling of patients, (aged between 25to43), participated in this study. The Nordic standard questionnaire and Slump clinical test were used for evaluation of low back pain and pressure on the nerve root, respectively. MAPO (Movement and Assistance of Hospital Patients) quantitative index was used for evaluating the ergonomic risk level of manual handling of patients in 16 sectors of a hospital including 174 wards.

Results: The results showed that ergonomic risk level was high. Ninety percents of evaluated wards were in red band. Based on results of Nordic questionnaire, %66.7 of nurses had experienced back pain in the past 12 months. Based on the results, 46.7% of  nurses who were active in sectors with high ergonomic risk have been suffering of back pain in the past 12 months and 53.3% of theirs slump test were positive. The Chi-Square test confirmed that there is a significant relationship between low back pain prevalence and risk level from the MAPO index in parts. (p=0.004)

Conclusion:  Findings from this study showed that there was a relationship between ergonomic conditions of hospital’s sectors with back pain in nurses. Therefore, it is expected to improve ergonomic conditions particularly supply of adequate human resources, supply of auxiliary equipments for patient transmission, repairs timely and implementation of reforms constructive is associated with reduced incidence of back pain in nurses.

Key words: Ergonomic risk level, MAPO index, Slump clinical test, Low back pain, Nurses.