Musculoskeletal disorders

Overall scale

Musculoskeletal disorders have consistently been the most commonly reported type of work-related illness in the Self-reported Work-related Illness (SWI) questionnaire module included annually in the national Labour Force Survey (LFS). Latest results indicate that in 2008/09 an estimated prevalence of 538 000 people in Great Britain, who worked in the last year, suffered from a musculoskeletal disorder caused or made worse by their current or past work. This equates to 1800 per 100 000 people (1.8%) who worked in the last 12 months in Great Britain.

Of these, an estimated 227 000 (42%) suffered from a disorder mainly affecting their back, 215 000 (40%) from a disorder mainly affecting their upper limbs or neck, and 96 000 (18%) mainly affecting their lower limbs (Table SWIT3W12). Of the estimated prevalence of work-related musculoskeletal disorders in people who worked in the last year, about a third of cases (191 000) were new (incidence) cases (Table SWIT6W12). This equates to an estimated incidence rate of 630 per 100 000 people (0.63%). Whilst this rate has fluctuated in recent years it is statistically significantly lower than in 2001/02, and in 2006/07 (Table SWIT6W12SIG).

Since January 1996, occupational physicians have reported new cases of musculoskeletal disorders, along with other occupational diseases to OPRA. Since October 1997 rheumatologists have been reporting to MOSS, the surveillance scheme for musculoskeletal disorders caused by work. Table THORM01 shows that occupational physicians reporting to OPRA saw an estimated 2236 new cases of work-related musculoskeletal disorders in 2008 and a further estimated 1533 individuals were seen by rheumatologists reporting to MOSS in the same period. In 2008, upper limb disorders accounted for just over 58% of all diagnoses made by rheumatologists and occupational physicians in the MOSS and OPRA schemes. Spine or back disorders (neck/thoracic spine, lumbar spine/trunk) accounted for approximately 30% of diagnoses, whilst lower limb disorders (hip/knee/leg, ankle/foot) comprised an estimated 6% of all diagnoses. THORGP data, in which General Practitioners submit data on work-related ill-health, found that upper limb disorders accounted for 47% of all musculoskeletal diagnoses, with spine or back disorders accounting for 37% and lower limb and all others comprising the remaining 16% (THORGP10).

The Industrial Injuries Disablement Benefit Scheme (IIDB) provides statistics on a limited number of specifically work-related musculoskeletal disorders that are classed as prescribed diseases under the scheme: namely beat hand, beat elbow, beat knee, cramp of the hand or forearm and inflammation of tendons of the hand, forearm or associated tendon sheaths (tenosynovitis). Beat hand and beat elbow are grouped together because of small numbers. With the exception of beat knee these are all upper limb disorders. Table IIDB02 shows that in 2007/08 there were 255 new cases assessed for disablement benefit due to a prescribed musculoskeletal disorder under the Industrial Injuries Scheme. In addition 530 new cases of carpal tunnel syndrome were assessed for disablement benefit (Table IIDB03)

Note: From April 2002 the figures include a small number of cases where the claimant has been assessed as suffering but with no loss of faculty, or where the percentage disability had not been coded at the time of publication due to the provisional nature of the data.