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Fatigue Monitoring System Holds Promise in Preventing Warfighter Injuries
Musculoskeletal (MSK) injuries account for the overwhelming majority of injuries in the military — up to 82% in the U.S. Army, by some estimates — and 59% of all limited-duty days, according to 2019 statistics. These injuries are often preceded by physical fatigue, a natural consequence of performing strenuous activity, particularly under heavy and irregular loads.
Scientists at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, are working on a system to monitor physical fatigue in near-real time. Such a capability could prevent countless MSK injuries, and fits into a larger portfolio of work at the Laboratory focused on predictive health and human performance modeling.
“We see a high incidence of MSK injuries in the Department of Defense year over year, but physical fatigue, which is a common precursor to those injuries, often goes underreported,” said David Drewry III, who manages a research portfolio dedicated to Army operational readiness at APL. “In part, that’s unavoidable, because it’s in the nature of military culture to push through the pain and keep working. So there is a real need for objective, quantitative methods to assess whether someone is getting fatigued to the point that they’ve become susceptible to an injury.”