Monitoring blood lead levels in workers overexposed to occupational lead: An analysis of Israeli data
✍ Scribed by Estela Derazne; Ernesto Kahan; Milene Rybski; Ralph Shain; Ruth Ashkenazi
- Publisher
- John Wiley and Sons
- Year
- 1996
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 501 KB
- Volume
- 29
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0271-3586
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
In a retrospective cohort study, we followed the blood lead [Pb(B)] and zinc protoporphyrin (ZPP) determinations of 292 workers found to have Pb(B) levels above the biological exposure index (BEI) during 1987-1993. The results indicated that (a) 22.6% of these workers were never retested for Pb(B) during the follow-up period; (b) 38.5% of the workers tested in the first year of the follow-up continued to exhibit Pb(B) levels above the BE1 (84.7% of them also had ZPP 2100 pg/dl); (c) about 25% of the remaining cohort had at least one more result above the BE1 during the fourth, jifth, and sixth years of follow-up; and (d) the incidence density rate of recurrence of Pb(B) concentrations above the BE1 was 0.236. We recommend the establishment of a target value lower than the BE1 that should be reached before the reinstatement of the overexposed worker. In our view this target value, combined with an efficient control of industrial hygiene conditions, will decrease the rate of recurrence of overexposure.