Musculoskeletal disorders - guidance and research

This page provides useful information on where to find out more about MSDs and how to prevent them.

Guidance and regulations - available now from HSE Books

General priced guidance:

• Manual Handling: Guidance on the Regulations (ISBN 0 7176 2823 X)
• Upper Limb Disorders in the Workplace (ISBN 0 7176 1978 8)
• Management of Health and Safety at Work (ISBN 0 7176 2488 9)
• Workplace Health, Safety and Welfare (ISBN 0 7176 0413 6)
• Work with display screen equipment: guidance on regulations (ISBN 0717625826).
• The law on VDUs: an easy guide (ISBN 0 7176 2602 4)
• Manual handling : solutions you can handle (ISBN 0 7176 0693 7)
• A pain in your workplace? Ergonomic problems and solutions (ISBN 0717606686)

Sector specific priced guidance:

• Handling home care (ISBN 0 7176 2228 2)
• Manual handling in the health services (ISBN 0 7176 1248 1)
• Caring for cleaners (ISBN 0 7176 2682 2)
• Backs for the future : safe manual handling in construction (ISBN 0717611221)
• Moving food and drinks : manual handling solutions for the food and drinks industries (ISBN 0 7176 1731 9)
• Well handled : off-shore manual handling solutions (ISBN 0 7176 1385 2)

Free leaflet guidance on:

• Are you making the best use of lifting and handling aids [PDF 400kb]
• Display Screen Equipment [1.4mb]
• Manual Handling
• Aching Arms (or RSI) in small businesses [PDF]
• Checkouts and Musculoskeletal Disorders INDG269

The information from Back in Work: managing back pain in the workplace (INDG333) has been updated and can be found on the back pain section.

Statistics on Work-related Musculoskeletal Disorders can be found at www.hse.gov.uk/statistics/disease.htm

Relevant research

HSE has published a large amount of research material related to MSDs which can be found listed under the following headings.

• Research Agenda [140kb]

Search for research on:

• Musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs)
• Upper limb disorders (ULDs)
• Work related upper limb disorders (WRULDs)
• Display screen equipment (DSE)
• Visual display units (VDUs)
• Back pain research
• Manual handling research

Further sources of information

• Prosecutions database
• Notices database
• Risk assessment
• Useful links page

Other helpful HSE web pages

• Ergonomics in the pharmaceutical industry
• Construction
• Health Services
• Agriculture
• Manual Handling Assessment Tool
• Stress
• Securing Health Together
• Back Pain
• Manual Handling Assessment Chart (MAC)
• Printing Industry (includes manual handling section)
• Air Transport
• Government Setting an Example