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

Si Si,Julie Crewe,Alison Reid,Deborah C. Glass,Michael J. Abramson,Tim Driscoll,Ellie Darcey,Renee N. Carey,Lin Fritschi,Geza P. Benke,Susan Peters

doi:10.1186/s12890-016-0212-6

Abstract

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.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12890-016-0212-6) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Highlights

There is very little information available on a national level as to the number of people exposed to specific asthmagens in workplaces
No response was recorded after 10 call attempts from 10,284 households (“unknown households”), 21,429 contacts were deemed ineligible and 1318 refused to participate (Fig. 1)
Occupational asthma is an ideal candidate for prevention and these results present clear opportunities for policy action which would be of practical benefit

Summary

Introduction

There is very little information available on a national level as to the number of people exposed to specific asthmagens in workplaces. Allergic occupational asthma is caused by exposures to agents which sensitize the airways. Non-allergic occupational asthma is less common (perhaps 10 % of all occupational asthma) and is a result. A study in the aluminium industry showed that the incidence of occupational asthma in seven smelters had declined from 9.46/1000 per year in 1992 to 0.36/1000 per year in 2006; a 96.2 % reduction [4]. This reduction was ascribed to improvements in control of exposures, respiratory protection and pre-placement medical assessments

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion