Perception of Exercise Among Tamil Population with Musculoskeletal Conditions

Aim: This assignment aims to search a relevant research question along with justified rationale for the selected question. The appropriate methodology and paradigms will be discussed to analyse critically the selected research question, present practices, context, skills and competencies. The factors create influence, barrier, and impact to the chosen research topics are discussed thoroughly. The conclusion part of the assignment is concerned with identifying appropriate solutions to handle all the factors efficiently to control spread of MSDs. Moreover, for identifying strength and weakness, SWOT analysis is done and an action plan is included in the conclusion part.

Research Question: “What is perception of exercise among Tamil population with musculoskeletal diseases in reducing and managing chronic pain? ”

Contemporary issues: Musculoskeletal disorders are common in the prevalent time, and are getting popular since ages. However, the acceptance of the scenario has not been taken into consideration until now, and the chance of increased burden is not acceptable too. Science has been advancing in a tremendous rate, and many medical conditions are curable for that. Science has prove to be beneficial in many medical ailments, and in the case of musculoskeletal condition, significant improvement has been evident. In a number of cases, there are evidence of patients who regained mobility and function but the main cure for this particular ailment has remained in an elusive manner. According to Einiö&Martikainen(2018), the scientific research needs to provide certain answer to the prevalent issues, and until then the healthcare cost would be increasing radically. Musculoskeletal disorders effect across the entire life in a considerable approach and there are millions of people, who are suffering due to this. This disorder is painful that deliberately affecting the daily lives of people and due to this, the productivity scale has also been altered. There are some musculoskeletal disorders, that are being treated and the possibility of healing can be there, but on the other hand, this issues even in the milder forms can affect the daily life. There are people who reportedly unable to perform normal common activity, such as, walking, getting out of a chair, going to bathrooms etc.

These kinds of disorders certainly interfere with work related activities and become an issue that needs to be eliminated. MSD affects people of all ages, although the intensity level increases with the weariness of age. Still changing behaviours and the interventions of normal life and the practise of healthy lifestyle including exercises can change the entire scenario and a healthy life can be obtained. For most people, the problem of low bone mass starts at the age of early 20’s, and this is the time when bone density and quality are being built for the entire life. There are certain injuries that can be generated from sports activities, including sprains and strains and this can lead to chronic illness for the entire lifetime (Pelletier, Higgins& Bourbonnais, 2015). The incidence of the MSD disorder was 13. 6 percent per person, 4. 2 percent per person in a joint and 4. 6 percent per person. The new onset of MSD has marked an effect in the physical domain, with comparatively lesser effect on social and mental functioning. In accordance with the current and contemporary scenario, MSD can have serious consequences at any age, but it becomes more problematic in the older people, often it causes a downward health spiral that gets difficult to reverse. These issues can be overcome by developing a healthy lifestyle so that the immense problem can be solved accordingly. The musculoskeletal system covers all the physical structures necessary for the movement, including the bone structure and a solution should encompass concerning the issue.

The treatment of this disorder is too costly, in the contemporary times and would be more costly in the future. According to Bailey et al. (2015), many studies find that MSDs are single source of most of workplace injuries in all over the world. Most of companies have to bear huge workers’ compensation cost near up to 30% to fight with MSDs. The amount is $50 billion as direct cost in US companies and indirect cost are almost equal to five times the direct cost of MSDs. The MSDs also known as repetitive motion injury are related with injuries and disorders that affect body movement or particularly musculoskeletal system. The Musculoskeletal system comprises of muscles, ligaments, tendons, nerves, blood vessels etc. Damage of musculoskeletal system generally occurs due to excessive repetition and stress as find by many researchers. MSDs are result of extreme fatigue when it outrageous body’s recovery system. This lead to musculoskeletal imbalance and persistent musculoskeletal imbalances lead to musculoskeletal disorder. Nevertheless, musculoskeletal disorders are disastrous and it can be prevented with proper protective measures. For understanding, the impact of MSDs is important to get the statistical data about the diseases.

The statistical data shows that impact of disease is huge and many people are affected by the disease MSDs. As opined by Boubaker et al. (2014), employees with MSDs have low hard working capability and give low performance, which in turn reduces company performance. The company has to bear huge cost for compensating the employees with MSDs. The compensation burden reduces revenue level of the company and increases burden of insurance for the employees. Many countries companies find sacking employees with MSDs is best solution to reduce their burden. Therefore, MSDs affected many employees in many angles and the statistic shows that near 33% of sacked employees are sacked due to MSDs. The factors responsible for MSDs can be divided to work related or ergonomic and individual related risk factor. The ergonomic risk factor are associated with force, posture and repetition while poor work, practices, poor fitness, poor health habits are part of individual risk factor for MSDs (Bonzini et al. , 2015). The data related with MSDs in Tamil Nadu (TN) are analysed with respect to sex division and labour force participation. It shows that both male and females is victim of MSDs and the statistical data shows that females are more prone to MSDs than males. The case of pain in lower back, upper back, limbs and knees, female victims are much larger in number than male. The literacy rate of TN is 80. 09 % according to 2011 census and the labour participation rate is 59. 3% according to 2011 census. This figure shows that people affected by MSDs are mostly happened due to ergonomic risk factor.

However, most female affected by MSDs are affected by individual risk factor, as the ratio of male female in labour force is not equal. The male labour force participation is more than the female and therefore, this can be inferred that female MSDs are result of individual related while the male MSDs are resulted from work related stress and pressure. The overall data related with MSDs are source of high concern for government and the general people. All type of musculoskeletal Pains is affecting more people every year. The statistical data about pain with last one week is more than pain in last one year. As stated by Sivagurunathan et al. (2017), this proves that MSDs is dragging more and more people into the danger zone and disability in future, thus increasing the number of disability adjusted life year (DALY). All type of pain in joint, elbow, shoulder, wrist, upper back, lower back, thigh, knee, and feet has affected more people with short span of time. In TN 82% male and 64% female are literate; however this data is different in case of rural and urban. Study finds that 62% of women are more concerned with MSDs and want to follow the remedial exercise regularly to handle MSDs. The below graph shows that the rate of other type of pain is similar between male and female but the case MSDs are high among female.

The 53. 70% female are victim of musculoskeletal pain while the number is only 32. 70% among male (Anap et al. , 2017). Details analyzing about musculoskeletal pain shows that MSDs mostly affect lower back and upper back. After lower back and upper back, neck and shoulder are mostly affected body parts due to MSDs. The following graph depicts the phenomenon clearly. It is notable that TN has high literature rate still it has large number of people affected with MSDs. The research depicts that most of the MSDs affected people almost 20% are treated in government hospital whereas only 11% people get treatment from private hospital. Therefore, this can be inferred with the above data that people affected by musculoskeletal pains are mostly low income group those who cannot afford private hospital treatment. The significance of this research can be further enhanced with help of the present research. The present assignment tries to focus on improved treatment, control and reducing burden of MSDs. The patient with MSDs faces high pain and researching pain relief formula is essential to stop MSDs form capturing more people. After executing the research, the outcome would be helpful for Tamil people and researchers to demonstrate treatment strategies to patients, doctors, physiotherapists and other people involved with the field in order to ensure better recovery form pain.

Paradigms: Understanding philosophy behind research is crucial rather than conducting research on previous beliefs. Research philosophy should be chosen for appropriate comprehension of research. Along with research philosophy, the research must identify proper paradigm that suit the research best. There are number of research paradigms and selecting the right one depends on types of data is selected for the research purpose. The selection of research paradigm is done with keeping mind the fact that the present research is being executing to look for solutions to the problem of MSDs. After understanding the value and concepts of research paradigms, constructivist or interpretivist paradigm is chosen for the present research (Wood, 2015). As this research is related with intention to investigate understanding of different groups of population the constructivist paradigms would best serve the purpose. In order to get better idea of MSDs and its impact on people, understanding the relevance of exercise in this sphere it is crucial to select right strategy and interpretivist is appropriate with this aim.

Choosing the methodology of the research: The suitable method for this assignment is qualitative method as the nature of the research aims to analyze the perception of exercise on Tamil population effected by musculoskeletal disease. The qualitative research methodology permits the researchers to have direct interaction with the respondents. Along with direct interaction with respondents the qualitative data collection method also ensures enrichment of gathered data. In addition to, the qualitative method is more preferable and suitable for the research as the proposed research question cannot be asked to individual people. Moreover, as stated by Meadows & Wimpenny, (2016) for in depth, detailed analysis of perspective, feelings, behaviour, feelings and experiences of the respondent it is necessary to choose appropriate method and qualitative method is best suitable for proposed research. The qualitative method seeks to follow naturalistic inquiry and in depth understanding of social phenomenon in the natural settings. The qualitative method applies multiple inquiry system and rather than following only logical and statistical theories. Therefore, with application of qualitative method, interviews, questionnaires and focus group can be conducted.

Methods of data collection: As opined by Woodyatt et al. (2016), for collecting data for the purpose of present research proper geographical location need to be selected. Along with geographical location the selected population group is needed to chosen carefully. Conducting research in place where people are less affected by MSDs would not serve the purpose of the research. However, the researcher is currently stays in UK, but wish to carry out research in Tamil Nadu, a state in southern part of India. Therefore, for collecting data the researcher have to depend on the online data collection method. The online data collection method provides opportunity to collect data of any location from any place and everybody can participate from all over the world. However, apart from the positive sides of online data collection procedure, there is some limitation associated with the online data collection process. The interviews are conducted through online may lack the clarity, trust, empathy, quality of reflective, which may not arise in case of face to face interview.

Focus group online: A focus group includes target group of individual those are included and invited to participate in the discussion. The people are added into the focus group are selected with a particular criteria so that only target and interested people are added. The people can share their opinion and idea with the focus group. According to Palinkas et al. , (2015) the online focus group is type of focus group that is also part of online research methods and is nature of business to business research and political research. In the present scenario, focus groups are applied in common settings in order to understand the perception of exercise on Tamil population with MSDs. The gathered data is qualitative in nature and the focus group focus on generating themes by gathering data from the respondent by asking the research question. The research question is comprised of many questions with multiple options and this is important for conducting research. The researcher intends to keep the research on track and follow the research strictly on focus group. This will help the participants to give right answer and the researcher will get right data for the proposed research. The respondent will prefer to give their original answer as they will see the other people to give their original answer in the focus group. The traditional focus group is now replaced by online focus group and discussion can now include more number of people.

As stated by Kamberelis & Dimitriadis, (2018) the online focus group helps to share opinion of people and for researcher get required answer from wide range of people. The online focus groups are faster in gathering information than the other type of data collection method. An asynchronous online focus group can do data collection in fraction of time than time consuming traditional face to face interviews. In terms of cost, the online focus group is more cost effective than the other type of data collection process. The online focus group gives the facilities of giving answer anytime during the tenure of research. This is very much advantageous for the working persons and busy person to participate in any research or survey work. The biggest advantageous of online focus group has no particular geographic boundary, therefore, participants can join the discussion form any part of the world at any time. However, apart from the advantageous of online focus group there are some limitations associated with it (Taylor et al. , 2015). With face to face interview, the interviewer can clarify any answer if he or she doubts that the respondent has not understood the question properly. The online focus groups are non verbal in nature and hence, the researcher cannot get the body language, movement, voice tone during the interview.

One to one interaction: online interview: Apart from qualitative data collection procedure and online focus group, other types of interview methods are considered. The interview can be in form of structured or unstructured, this can even be semi structured (Smith, 2015). However, participants can be done face to face interview through online. Apart from all, the synchronous interaction ensures more attachment and genuine answer form the respondents.

Anticipated methodology: Factors considered for the research, are as follows:

· The importance of selecting appropriate research methods for data collecting during the execution of research with relevance to the topics.

· For collecting original data and have the view of the respondents directly from them, online data collection procedure is chosen. To have face to face interview online interview is done in Face time or Skype to ensure that respondent feel free to answer the question accurately.

· As face to face interview ahs some limitation in terms of technology and communication, other methods like online focus group is selected. Online focus group is created to encourage people with MSDs to give their view and join the discussion form India.

Potential difficulties: The chosen population for the present research is Tamil Nadu form India and researcher stays in UK. Therefore, this causes a problem in terms of geographical, technical problem. The researcher has to gather data with staying in UK and it is difficult to collect full accurate data. Including the target group into the research process like people with MSDs are mainly from the target group of the proposed research is challenging.

Practical consideration: The practical consideration for the proposed research can be related with timely factor and maintaining proposed budget. The method of data collection requires budget, for this is important to plan the research process properly. Proper planning will help to maintain the budget and the research can be ended in selected time.

Ethical consideration: For conducting research, researcher needs to take permission of university and organization from Tamil. The researcher should take permission from all people involved in the research process and all the information taken from the respondent must be kept in confidential. All respondent must be felt that they can give their information fearlessly as the information will be used only for research purpose.

Personal consideration: Form the personal perspective, the challenging factor lies in fact that the researcher stay in UK and the target group of the research is from Tamil Nadu. This includes challenges to involve the appropriate target group into the research process. The geographical barrier is one of the major problems for the proposed research.

Conclusion: Research is done particularly to explore the topics and analysing the topics to understand the problem detailed manner. This assignment aims to in depth analysis of perception of exercise for Tamil population with MSDs. This research will help to understand the impact of musculoskeletal disease and effect of exercise in reducing pain. The result of research will provide required information to handle the disease and relief people from musculoskeletal pain.