Current PhD Students
Yoko Ellie Fukumura
Faculty Mentor:
Shawn C. Roll PhD, OTR/L, RMSKS, FAOTA, FAIUM
Research Lab: Musculoskeletal Sonography and Occupational Performance Lab
Year of Entry: 2019
Research Interests
Workplace injury continues to prevail despite guidelines and policy level change. Through the PhD program, I hope to further understand musculoskeletal injury from an occupational science perspective to change the ways in which we address injury prevention. As a research assistant in the Musculoskeletal Sonography and Occupational Performance lab, I am working on an interdisciplinary project to create an office workstation that uses machine learning to promote health behavior change and prevent injury. We are currently studying ergonomics of computer users to develop an algorithm that accurately senses the user’s posture in a pilot study. Through this study, we also hope to enhance our understanding of ergonomics and human behavior at the office workstation. I hope to apply the knowledge I gain from this project to address injury prevention in musicians in the future.
Education
Master of Arts (MA)
in Occupational Therapy
2019 | University of Southern California
Bachelor of Music
in Piano Performance
2017 | New England Conservatory of Music
Publications
Journal Articles
Roll, S. C., Tung, K. D., Chang, H., Sehremelis, T. A., Fukumura, Y. E., Randolph, S., & Forrest, J. L. (2019). Prevention and rehabilitation of musculoskeletal disorders in oral health care professionals: A systematic review. The Journal of the American Dental Association, 150(6), 489-502. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.adaj.2019.01.031 Show abstract
Background. The authors’ objective in this systematic review was to describe the evidence for preventive and rehabilitative interventions for musculoskeletal disorders in oral health care.
Types of Studies Reviewed. The authors conducted systematic search, screening, and eligibility processes to identify experimental, quasiexperimental, observational, and survey research studies in which the investigators either directly evaluated or predicted the effects of preventive or rehabilitative interventions on the reduction of musculoskeletal symptoms in oral health care professionals.
Results. The authors identified and screened 3,571 unique abstracts, assessed 256 full-text articles for eligibility, and included 34 articles in the review. Investigators in 17 experimental studies described the results of preventive or rehabilitation interventions and in 17 survey research studies predicted or correlated preventive or protective techniques to a reduction in musculoskeletal symptoms. The primary techniques evaluated in the studies included equipment modification, ergonomic training, and physical exercise.
Conclusions and Practical Implications. The evidence suggests that magnification loupes and indirect-vision techniques have a positive effect on the reduction of musculoskeletal symptoms. In terms of evaluating intervention efficacy, other techniques have mixed evidence or are limited by low-level study design.
Keywords. Ergonomics; injury prevention; musculoskeletal disorders; dentists; dental hygienists
Conference Presentations/Proceedings
Tung, K. D., Fukumura, Y. E., Baker, N. A., Forrest, J. L., & Roll, S. C. (2019). Identifying an optimal sampling method to estimate postural risk in a dynamic work task. Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting, 63(1), 1028-1033. https://doi.org/10.1177/1071181319631180 Show abstract
Introduction. The Rapid Upper Limb Assessment (RULA) is an ergonomic assessment tool used to screen for risk of musculoskeletal injury due to working posture. The RULA is traditionally applied once during a work task to approximate overall risk. No method exists for estimating a RULA score for work requiring frequent shifts in posture across an extended period of time.
Purpose. The goal of this study was to identify an optimal sampling method for applying the RULA across a long time-period that accurately represents overall risk.
Methods. Four right-handed female dental hygiene students were video recorded from three angles while performing hand scaling during patient clinic visits (88.97 minutes on average). RULA was continuously scored across the entire session, updating the score when a significant postural shift lasting for more than 15 seconds occurred. A time-weighted average (TWA) RULA score was calculated. Three sampling methods were evaluated: equivalent interval samples, random samples, and random samples selection weighted within “clock positions.” Each method was compared to the TWA using a paired samples t-test and percent difference.
Results. TWA RULA across the four students ranged from 3.4 to 4.3. Preliminary sampling averages using 10 samples were all within 0.2 of the TWA. Further iterations evaluating various sample sizes is ongoing.
Discussion. Preliminary results suggest that all three sampling methods provide a reasonably accurate approximation of the TWA score at the sampling rate tested. Future iterations of this analysis will be continued to identify the minimum required sampling rate to meet our TWA criterion.
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