Ergonomic advice

With ergonomic advice and ergonomic training you can prevent or reduce complaints.

If employees carry out intensive repetitive work, have to sit in one posture for long periods or deal with physical workload, there is an increased risk of complaints in the arm, neck, back or shoulders.

Ergonomic advice focuses on removing those risk factors: the layout of the workplace, the equipment and the way the work is done.

Ergonomic advice is not a matter of taste. It rests on a framework of legislation and standards, and that framework determines what we look at.

• Dutch Working Conditions Decree (Arbobesluit), Article 5.4. Workplaces are set up according to ergonomic principles, unless that cannot reasonably be required. That is the legal basis under every piece of ergonomic advice.
• Arbobesluit Chapter 5, Section 2, screen work. These requirements apply as soon as someone does screen work for more than two hours a day on average. Among other things, they stipulate that the lighting provides sufficient light and a suitable contrast between the screen and its surroundings, and that glare and distracting reflections on the screen are avoided.
• NEN 1824:2010. The Dutch standard for the floor area of office workplaces. A display screen workplace requires at least 6 m² per person, including the office chair and circulation space. If the workplace is used for less than two hours a day, 4 m² is the minimum. This standard is private law and therefore not mandatory, unless parties agree to it among themselves.
• NEN-EN-ISO 9241-5:2024. The international standard for the layout of the workplace and the postures that go with it, revised in 2024. Its starting point is that people adopt different postures during work, sitting, leaning and standing, and that a workplace which allows this encourages movement and helps prevent complaints.

If you want to know how those requirements work out in daily practice, see ergonomic working.

First we look at the extent to which the ergonomics of the workplace are matched to the work. We map any ergonomic risks and assess whether the current ergonomic conditions are being used well. We advise on ergonomic adjustments to the workplace, combined with advice on optimising working posture and working habits. That way employees know what they can do to get the most out of ergonomic adjustments in the workplace.
In addition, we offer workshops and advice in which employees learn how to optimise their own workplace. This also includes practical tips and exercises that can easily be integrated into the daily routine.

We advise on the following issues:

An ergonomic adviser is usually called in when a choice has to be made that goes beyond a single workplace.

• For a new build, relocation or refurbishment. Once handed over, the layout is fixed. Thinking it through in advance is cheaper than adjusting afterwards.
• When purchasing furniture or equipment. Which type of chair, desk or input device suits the work that is being done, and where the difference between suppliers lies.
• For an employee with a disability or chronic condition. Standard furniture is often not sufficient there and an individual assessment is needed.
• When in doubt whether the workplace complies with laws and regulations. For example following a risk inventory and evaluation or a remark from the occupational physician.
• For recurring complaints in a department. If several people have the same complaints, the cause rarely lies with a single chair.

If it concerns one employee with complaints, a workplace assessment is more appropriate. If you want to walk through a whole department briefly, workplace advice is the quicker route.

For an employee with a disability, a chronic condition or lasting limitations in work capacity, a standard set-up is usually not enough. The question is then not which furniture is best, but which adjustment makes this work feasible for this person.

We look at what the work demands, what the employee can handle and which adjustment bridges that gap. That may be furniture or equipment, but just as well the division of tasks, the working hours or the order of activities.

If the process runs through an occupational physician, occupational expert or case manager, we align with that. For the question of what someone can handle at this moment, a work capacity assessment is the appropriate instrument.

A great deal of research has been done on whether ergonomic measures reduce complaints. The outcomes are more nuanced than is often suggested, and that determines how we advise.

The most recent overview. Santos and colleagues published a systematic review of 25 studies in the Journal of Clinical Medicine in 2025, with a meta-analysis of 24 randomised trials. Ergonomic measures demonstrably reduce work-related pain, most clearly in the lower back, the upper back, the neck, the wrist and the ankle. For shoulders, arms, elbows, knees and thighs no significant effect was found. The mean difference in pain score came to −0.28 on the VAS scale; for the lower back an odds ratio of 0.53.

The authors themselves immediately add a caveat. The effect is small, and whether it is clinically meaningful is the question. Their conclusion is that ergonomic measures alone are not enough and must be combined with exercise, rehabilitation and building strength.

What was already there. The Cochrane review by Hoe and colleagues from 2018 pooled fifteen studies among office workers and looked at preventing arm, shoulder and neck complaints. It was more cautious: it is uncertain whether an arm support at the mouse prevents complaints, and the evidence for the other physical, organisational and cognitive measures was uncertain too. Note the scope: it concerns prevention in office work, not physically heavy work.

The Institute for Work & Health studied participatory ergonomics, in which employees themselves contribute to the solution. Partial to moderate evidence was found for fewer complaints and fewer days of sickness absence. Interventions made up of several components, and certainly those in which movement plays a role, do better after six and twelve months than single measures.

What does not come out is just as important. In most studies no statistically significant effect on sickness absence and work performance has been shown. Anyone selling ergonomics with a promise about absence figures goes further than the research allows.

What that means for our advice. Buying furniture alone is the most weakly supported option, and that is what both the 2025 research and the older reviews conclude. The evidence is most favourable where adjusting the workplace goes together with involvement of the employee, explanation of working posture and variation in movement. That is why ergonomic advice from us consists of those three components, and not of a list of products. Our advice is also independent: we are not tied to a supplier and do not sell furniture or equipment ourselves.