Respiratory Effects of Chronic Animal Feed Dust Exposure

• Published in: Journal of Occupational Health 2003-09, Vol.45 (5), p.324-330
• Main Authors: Baser, Sevin, Fisekci, Fatma Evyapan, Ozkurt, Sibel, Zencir, Mehmet
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adult; Animal feed dust; Animals; Chi-Square Distribution; Dust; Dust - analysis; Feed industry; Feeds; Female; Food-Processing Industry; Humans; Inhalation Exposure - adverse effects; Logistic Models; Male; Middle Aged; Occupational Diseases - etiology; Occupational Diseases - physiopathology; Occupational health; Organic dust; Prevalence; Pulmonary function tests; Respiratory function; Respiratory Function Tests; Respiratory symptoms; Respiratory tract; Respiratory Tract Diseases - etiology; Respiratory Tract Diseases - physiopathology; Risk Factors; Surveys and Questionnaires; Turkey
• ISSN: 1341-9145; 1348-9585; 1348-9585
• DOI: 10.1539/joh.45.324

Respiratory Effects of Chronic Animal Feed Dust Exposure : Sevin BASER, et al. Pulmonology Department, Pamukkale University Medical Faculty, Turkey-Aim-The aim of our study was to assess the prevalence of chronic work related respiratory symptoms and to determine lung function abnormalities in animal feed industry workers. Method-108 workers with a mean age of ± SD : 32 ± 7.11 yr employed in the animal feed industry and 108 unexposed subjects as a control group were enrolled in the study. All subjects filled out a questionnaire on their respiratory symptoms. Pulmonary function tests (PFTs) were conducted. Airborne dust (respirable fraction) was sampled during an 8-h work shift. Dust sampling was performed with a Casella AFC 123 machine. Results-A significantly higher prevalence of work related upper and lower respiratory tract symptoms such as cough (12%), dyspnea (5.6%) and sinusitis (8.3%) were found among the workers than in the control group (p=0.001, p=0.04 and p=0.008 respectively). Irritation symptoms such as pruritis of the eyes (11.1%), skin lesions (7.4%) and nose symptoms (8.3%) were also significantly higher among workers that in the control group (p=0.001 , p=0.014 and p=0.005 respectively). The mean PFTs (predicted %) of the workers ; forced vital capacity (FVC)% ± SD (85.23 ± 12.06), 1-s forced expiratory volume (FEV1)% ± SD (88.73 ± 13.09), peak expiratory flow (PEF)% ± SD (70.64 ± 18.76) and forced expiratory flow rate at 25-75% of the FVC (FEF25-75)% ± SD (88.42 ± 25.94) were found significantly lower than in the control group (p