Abstract
Background: The cashew processing is a labour-intensive work with a significant number of female workers. Majority belong to low socioeconomic status and so they join this sector to meet up their daily living. Long hours of work, greater work load and increased family burden lead to increase in morbidity status among workers. As comorbidities gets unnoticed and ignored, there is occurrence of early morbidity as well as mortality in these working groups and this is one of the major concerns. Methods: Cross-sectional study was conducted among female cashew workers in Kollam district, Kerala. Data was collected using interviewer administered questionnaire using stratified multistage cluster sampling method. Seven workers each were selected from shelling, peeling and grading processing units from eight private and two government factories. Data entered in micrososft excel, coded and analyzed using SPSS software version 25. Descriptive statistics for qualitative data were expressed as frequency and percentages and quantitative data as mean and standard deviation Results: Out of 210 participants, 95.4% workers were suffering from one or the other morbidities. Arthralgia was the major concern followed by allergy, hypertension and thyroid. Prehypertensive state was found to be present among all participants. Anxiety noticed in majority of participants. Conclusions: Frequent medical check-ups, recreational activities and health education sessions needs to be implemented in all cashew factories to lessen the morbidity and to up bring the health status of workers.
Published Version (
Free)
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callMore From: International Journal Of Community Medicine And Public Health
Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
