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Varrecchia T, Ranavolo A, Chini G, De Nunzio AM, Draicchio F, Martinez-Valdes E, Falla D, Conforto S. High-density surface electromyography allows to identify risk conditions and people with and without low back pain during fatiguing frequency-dependent lifting activities. J Electromyogr Kinesiol 2023; 73:102839. [PMID: 37948840 DOI: 10.1016/j.jelekin.2023.102839] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/10/2023] [Revised: 10/24/2023] [Accepted: 11/03/2023] [Indexed: 11/12/2023] Open
Abstract
Low back pain (LBP) is a leading cause of disability in the workplace, often caused by manually lifting of heavy loads. Instrumental-based assessment tools are used to quantitatively assess the biomechanical risk of lifting activities. This study aims to verify that, during the execution of fatiguing frequency-dependent lifting, high-density surface electromyography (HDsEMG) allows the discrimination of healthy controls (HC) versus people with LBP and biomechanical risk levels. Fifteen HC and eight people with LBP performed three lifting tasks with a progressively increasing lifting index, each lasting 15 min. Erector spinae (ES) activity was recorded using HDsEMG and amplitude parameters were calculated to characterize the spatial distribution of muscle activity. LBP group showed a less ES activity than HC (lower root mean square across the grid and of the activation region) and an involvement of the same muscular area across the task (lower coefficient of variation of the center of gravity of muscle activity). The results indicate the usefulness of HDsEMG parameters to classify risk levels for both HC and LBP groups and to determine differences between them. The findings suggest that the use of HDsEMG could expand the capabilities of existing instrumental-based tools for biomechanical risk classification during lifting activities.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tiwana Varrecchia
- Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Epidemiology and Hygiene, INAIL, Monte Porzio Catone, 00078 Rome, Italy.
| | - Alberto Ranavolo
- Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Epidemiology and Hygiene, INAIL, Monte Porzio Catone, 00078 Rome, Italy.
| | - Giorgia Chini
- Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Epidemiology and Hygiene, INAIL, Monte Porzio Catone, 00078 Rome, Italy.
| | - Alessandro Marco De Nunzio
- LUNEX International University of Health, Exercise and Sports, 50, Avenue du Parc des Sports, Differdange 4671, Luxembourg; Luxembourg Health & Sport Sciences Research Institute A.s.b.l., 50, Avenue du Parc des Sports, Differdange 4671, Luxembourg.
| | - Francesco Draicchio
- Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Epidemiology and Hygiene, INAIL, Monte Porzio Catone, 00078 Rome, Italy.
| | - Eduardo Martinez-Valdes
- Centre of Precision Rehabilitation for Spinal Pain (CPR Spine), School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation Sciences, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston B152TT, United Kingdom.
| | - Deborah Falla
- Centre of Precision Rehabilitation for Spinal Pain (CPR Spine), School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation Sciences, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston B152TT, United Kingdom.
| | - Silvia Conforto
- Department of Industrial, Electronic and Mechanical Engineering, Roma Tre University, Via Vito Volterra 62, Roma, Lazio, Italy.
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Varrecchia T, Ranavolo A, Conforto S, De Nunzio AM, Arvanitidis M, Draicchio F, Falla D. Bipolar versus high-density surface electromyography for evaluating risk in fatiguing frequency-dependent lifting activities. Appl Ergon 2021; 95:103456. [PMID: 33984582 DOI: 10.1016/j.apergo.2021.103456] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/05/2020] [Revised: 04/19/2021] [Accepted: 04/28/2021] [Indexed: 06/12/2023]
Abstract
Workers often develop low back pain due to manually lifting heavy loads. Instrumental-based assessment tools are used to quantitatively assess the biomechanical risk in lifting activities. This study aims to verify the hypothesis that high-density surface electromyography (HDsEMG) allows an optimized discrimination of risk levels associated with different fatiguing lifting conditions compared to traditional bipolar sEMG. 15 participants performed three lifting tasks with a progressively increasing lifting index (LI) each lasting 15 min. Erector spinae (ES) activity was recorded using both bipolar and HDsEMG systems. The amplitude of both bipolar and HDsEMG can significantly discriminate each pair of LI. HDsEMG data could discriminate across the different LIs starting from the fourth minute of the task while bipolar sEMG could only do so towards the end. The higher discriminative power of HDsEMG data across the lifting tasks makes such methodology a valuable tool to be used to monitor fatigue while lifting and could extend the possibilities offered by currently available instrumental-based tools.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tiwana Varrecchia
- Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Epidemiology and Hygiene, INAIL, Monte Porzio Catone, 00040, Rome, Italy; Department of Engineering, Roma Tre University, Via Vito Volterra 62, Roma, Lazio, Italy.
| | - Alberto Ranavolo
- Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Epidemiology and Hygiene, INAIL, Monte Porzio Catone, 00040, Rome, Italy.
| | - Silvia Conforto
- Department of Engineering, Roma Tre University, Via Vito Volterra 62, Roma, Lazio, Italy.
| | - Alessandro Marco De Nunzio
- LUNEX International University of Health, Exercise and Sports, 50, Avenue du Parc des Sports, Differdange, 4671, Luxembourg; Luxembourg Health & Sport Sciences Research Institute A.s.b.l., 50, Avenue du Parc des Sports, Differdange, 4671, Luxembourg.
| | - Michail Arvanitidis
- Centre of Precision Rehabilitation for Spinal Pain (CPR Spine), School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation Sciences, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, B152TT, United Kingdom.
| | - Francesco Draicchio
- Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Epidemiology and Hygiene, INAIL, Monte Porzio Catone, 00040, Rome, Italy.
| | - Deborah Falla
- Centre of Precision Rehabilitation for Spinal Pain (CPR Spine), School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation Sciences, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, B152TT, United Kingdom.
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