Abstract
Assessment of pulmonary fibrosis due to extreme and long-term exposure to welding fumes (siderofibrosis) – occupational disease no. 4115. Technical aspects – exposure to welding fumes Pulmonary fibrosis due to welding fumes (siderofibrosis) has occupational disease status in Germany. However, legislation covering the respective occupational disease requires “long-term and extreme exposure” to welding fumes for compensation by the social accident insurance. A recent social court sentence has evoked a discussion on how to further define these criteria. This article is intended to propose a science-based approach to the conditions under which welding fume exposure can be considered „extreme“. For this purpose, the authors discuss occupational exposure limits, circumstances influencing exposure intensity and utilization of welding fume measurement data. Furthermore, the article deals with the way court sentencing will affect suspected cases of siderofibrosis in the future and how the court´s reasoning is compatible with the occupational disease´s scientific report on the one hand and occupational safety regulations on the other hand. In compliance with the sentencing, „welding in confined spaces“ formerly applied as the sole criterion to consider welding conditions „extreme“ is now regarded as obsolete. A definite threshold value used to confirm the existence of „extreme“ conditions can neither be derived from the occupational disease´s scientific report nor from other sources. Given that, the authors propose to focus on welding methods used in specific cases with close regard to a welding procedere´s emission intensity and to occupational hygiene conditions in general when investigating whether conditions were „extreme“ or not. Regarding the mandatory criteria of „long-term exposure“ to welding fumes, only those times should be considered when welding was performed for several hours a day. Short-time exposures however, should not be taken into account. Keywords: welding – fume exposure – occupational disease – siderofibrosis – pulmonary fibrosis
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