The estimated prevalence of exposure to asthmagens in the Australian workforce, 2014

BMC Pulmonary Medicine

Research Article

Deborah C. Glass¹  Michael J. Abramson¹  Geza P. Benke¹  Susan Peters²  Lin Fritschi³  Renee N. Carey³  Julie Crewe³  Alison Reid³  Si Si³  Ellie Darcey³  Tim Driscoll⁴ 

[1] Monash Centre for Occupational and Environmental Health, School of Public Health & Preventive Medicine, Monash University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia;School of Population Health, University of Western Australia, Perth, Western Australia, Australia;School of Public Health, Curtin University, GPO Box U1987, 6845, Perth, Western Australia, Australia;Sydney School of Public Health, University of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia;

关键词: Occupational asthma;    Surveillance;    Workplace exposure;   

DOI  :  10.1186/s12890-016-0212-6

 received in 2016-01-21, accepted in 2016-03-31,  发布年份 2016

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundThere is very little information available on a national level as to the number of people exposed to specific asthmagens in workplaces.MethodsWe conducted a national telephone survey in Australia to investigate the prevalence of current occupational exposure to 277 asthmagens, assembled into 27 groups. Demographic and current job information were obtained. A web-based tool, OccIDEAS, was used to collect job task information and assign exposure to each asthmagen group.ResultsIn the Australian Workplace Exposure Study – Asthma (AWES- Asthma) we interviewed 4878 participants (2441 male and 2437 female). Exposure to at least one asthmagen was more common among men (47 %) than women (40 %). Extrapolated to the Australian population, approximately 2.8 million men and 1.7 million women were estimated to be exposed. Among men, the most common exposures were bioaerosols (29 %) and metals (27 %), whilst the most common exposures among women were latex (25 %) and industrial cleaning and sterilising agents (20 %).ConclusionsThis study provides information about the prevalence of exposure to asthmagens in Australian workplaces which will be useful in setting priorities for control and prevention of occupational asthma.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© Fritschi et al. 2016