Proceeding of the 2018 ErgoX Symposium Made Available by NIOSH

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) have published a thirty-page summary of the 2018 ErgoX Symposium: Exoskeletons in the Workplace.  Regardless of the symposium’s name, the topics of the first ErgoX applied to all applications of exo technology: medical, industrial, military and commercial.  Recurring themes focus on predicting fit, comfort, safety and the overall state of the technology.

Unlike our reports from the WearRAcon series which include samples of a fraction of the presentations, the NIOSH proceedings of ErgoX 2018 have a bullet point summary of the key points of every single presentation and the Q/A session that follows.  Additionally, the proceedings include an overview of the history and benefit of the ErgoX series.  As an added bonus, the proceedings also include the results of a survey of the 130 attendees asking them what issues and concerns they have moving forward with exo technology.

The NIOSH Proceeding of the 2018 ErgoX Symposium is a rare, free-of-charge, glimpse of an entire one-day exoskeleton technology conference.  A link to a digital copy of the publication can be found on the CDC website: https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/docs/2020-102/  In addition to the bullet point summary, many of the presentation slides can be viewed using the embedded links in the document.

“The content of the symposium attracted support and participation from many companies (e.g. Liberty Mutual, Boeing, Mawashi, Levitate), U.S. Federal agencies, (e.g. NIST, FDA, NIOSH, VA, etc.), universities, international Federal agencies, and scientific bodies (National Academy of Sciences).”

The second ErgoX event will be held on Oct 28, 2019 (ErgoX Symposium on Exoskeletons Scheduled to be Held the Day Prior to the 63rd HFES International Annual Meeting) immediately prior to the ASTM F48 second face-to-face meeting for 2019.

References:

NIOSH [2019] Proceedings of the 2018 Ergo-X Symposium: Exoskeletons in the Workplace — Assessing Safety, Usability, and Productivity. By Lowe B, Billotte W, Brogmus G, McDowell T, Reid C, Rempel D, Srinivasan D (Editors). Cincinnati, OH: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, DHHS (NIOSH) Publication No. 2020-102, https://doi.org/10.26616/NIOSHPUB2020102.