Introduction:

Works in hospital institutions in several countries is performed under inadequate working conditions. Concerning the ergonomic risk, this situation leads to illnesses in workers, such as musculoskeletal injuries, causing absenteeism in workers due to medical exemption certificates.

Objective:

To describe the arising musculoskeletal injuries and absenteeism-illness, also the working conditions that caused on the health personnel request for extended medical exemption certificates.

Method:

An observational, descriptive, and cross-sectional study was carried out, during the period September throughout October 2021, on 23 nursing professionals with extended medical exemption certificates, all of them associated to a public institution at the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, Argentina. The Standardized Nordic Questionnaire and the Questionnaire of Ergonomic Situation for working environment were used. The following variables were analyzed: working environment conditions, ergonomic risks and occupational hazards, musculoskeletal symptoms, absenteeism, body posture according to the spine and arms position.

Results:

The 60.9% of personnel surveyed were female. The mean age was 35.9 years, mode ≈39 and standard deviation 9.2 years. Injuries at the upper and lower back, neck and both shoulders prevailed. Concerning satisfaction on the ergonomic conditions of the furniture and the adopted body posture, 73.9% reported that it was not very satisfactory.

Conclusions:

The ergonomic risks that impact the nursing staff at this institution cause physical and mental damage due to the overload of the musculoskeletal apparatus and the cognitive function they have to perform in order to carry out their daily activities.

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