Citation

Hamidi Shishavan H, Henning R, Cherniack M, Kim I. Proc. Hum. Factors Ergon. Soc. Annu. Meet. 2022; 66(1): 1648-1652.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2022, Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, Publisher SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.1177/1071181322661267

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Nurses are exposed to incidents of workplace violence involving patients and their family members, and also coworkers. Studies of occupational stressors generally rely on subjective self-reports, questionnaires, or biometric and biochemical markers in long-cycle time intervals, but such assessments offer little guidance to HF/E intervention efforts. This study examined the viability of using wearable sensors to detect workplace violence incidents, and included measurement of pulse transit time (PTT) as a biomarker of continuous blood pressure. Six nurses were monitored over seven days. The electrocardiogram, PTT, and activity level were measured using a custom-designed armband. Participants used a wristwatch (Empatica E4) to log incidents, and a smartphone survey app to rate incident severity.

RESULTS show PTT was a more reliable indicator of workplace incidents than low- to high-frequency (LF/LH) ratio heart rate variability, offering a more robust way to continuously monitor critical events noninvasively over long periods in demanding work environments.

Language: en