Impact of occupational lead exposure on industrial workers health condition in Tehran-Iran

Abstract

Abstract. The continual occurrence of occupational lead exposure remains a serious  problem worldwide despite awareness of its adverse health effect. Blood lead Level (BLL) in a group of 31  male non smoking  industrial  workers  was determined. Then possible relationships between  BLL and health condition of workers , employment years,   and   fatigue and chronic bone pain symptom  were investigated. Workers  Blood lead level (BLL) were determined  by  GTA_AA-220  and hematology parameters were determined by Sysmex-K1000. The  workers  age mean  and employment years mean were  38± 8 years and 12±7.0 years respectively and BLL ranged from 15.50 µg/dL to 59.99 ug/dL with mean=34.80±12.90 µg/dL.  The pearson product moment test  indicated no correlations between BLL and Hgb (r =-0.09 & p=0.62  )  and BLL & Hct  ( r = -0.14 & p=0.46  ). However, BLL & employment years correlated (r = 0.37 & p= 0.04).  To investigate the effect of BLL on fatigue and  bone pain,  we used independent t-sample test and  results  indicated 23/31 workers with fatigue and bone pain had  higher BLL than those (8/31) without the symptoms ( mean= 38.41µg/dL vs mean= 20.44µg/dL, t= 6.06,p=0.00). Furthermore, they had many years of employment  (mean=13.4 years vs mean=8.8 years , t= 2.07, p=0.04 ).   In our study 74% of the exposed workers  complained of fatigue and  chronic bone pain with  BLL ( mean=38.41 µg/dL) and   employment ( mean=13.4 years). We conclude that  occurrence of    fatigue and chronic  bone pain symptom   may  associate with high blood lead level and   thus complementary to routine  BLL measurement and screening, bone lead   measurement  can be   an  important tool  in the study of chronic lead exposure among non-smoker and industrially  lead  exposed workers as well .

Keywords: Electrothermal atomic absorption spectroscopy, occupational lead exposure.

Keywords

• Electrothermal atomic absorption spectroscopy, occupational lead exposure

References

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