An evaluation of methods assessing the physical demands of manual lifting in scaffolding

At job level, all methods indicated that ergonomic interventions are required to protect scaffolders from an increased risk for low back pain. The NIOSH, Arbouw and practitioners' method resulted in a similar ranking order of tasks (transport>construction>dismantlement). In contrast, the observational method gave transport the lowest ranking. The underlying cause was probably that the observational method is more sensitive to durations of tasks and lifting within tasks than the three other methods.