OBJECTIVETo study the main risk factors of low back pain of workers ina foundry factory of the automobile company using cross sectional epidemiological investigation, and to provide scientific base for preventing the disorder.

METHODSThe low back pain and work loads of 1340 workers in a foundry factory of the automobile company were investigated using questionnaire, and logistic regression analysis was used to analyze the risk factors.

RESULTSThe one-year morbidity of low back pain in workers was 58.9% the morbidities of low back pain in workers engaged in foundry, transportation and modeling were 64.6%, 64.6% and 62.5%, respectively. The lifting with squat postures, bending trunk heavily, bending trunk with twisting and moving the heavy objects were found to be the most dominant risk factors for low-back pain, the OR values were 2.085, 1.961, 1.967 and 1.956, respectively. The distributions of risk factors were different among the different jobs. The logistic regression analysis showed that moving the heavy objects, lifting with squat postures, bending trunk heavily, bending trunk with twisting existed simultaneously, also the work years and gender were the risk factors.

CONCLUSIONThe manual moving heavy objects, awkward working posture or both were the most important risk factors for low-back pain. The intervene ergonomic study should be performed in future to reduce the morbidity of low-back pain.