Evaluation of Usability and Discomfort of Safety Footwear in Different Industries of Mazandaran Province

Providing safety for human resources in the industry is very important. Safety shoes are one of the most common PPEs that protect the foot against potential hazards. This study aimed to evaluate the discomfort and usability of safety shoes in different industries of Mazandaran province to find gaps in the quality of design and improve the design of safety shoes.

This was a cross-sectional study and was conducted in 2021.This study included employees of 11 different industrial companies that used seven safety shoe brands. They answered two researcher-made questionnaires, LPD (discomfort and general satisfaction) and SFUQ (usability). Data analysis was performed with Spearman rank correlation coefficient while Pearson correlation coefficient, and ANOVA test were also performed.

In total, 226 men with a mean age of 36.33 ± 7.4 years were included in this study. The participants reported the lowest usability for the brand G (3.3 and 3.99), and the least discomfort and the most usability index with the brand A (1.2 and 5.35). Overall, the highest satisfaction was reported for brand A and the lowest satisfaction to brand G.

The findings of this study showed that the main problem in comfort and usability is probably related to shoe molds because the manufacturers of safety shoes import molds from abroad that do not fit the anthropometric characteristics of Iranian users’ feet.