Risk factors causing health disorders among workers involved in oil extraction and performing their working tasks outdoors during a cold season

Abstract

The research focuses on a vital issue related to preserving health of workers who perform their working tasks outdoors in regions with cold climate. Our research goal was to examine influence exerted by working conditions and working experience length on prevalence of chronic diseases and other health disorders among workers who performed their working tasks outdoors during a cold season. We accomplished a cross (one-moment) epidemiologic study aimed at assessing adverse impacts exerted by weather and climatic factors on workers who performed their working tasks on open grounds in regions with cold climate. We conducted hygienic assessment of working conditions for 1.647 workers employed at oil-extracting enterprise in Nizhnevartovsk and analyzed results obtained during their regular medical check-ups. We analyzed average number of diseases per 1 worker; it varied from (0.45 ± 0.06) among workers dealing with electrogas welding to (0.27 ± 0.022) among compressor unit operators. Each additional 5 years of working experience resulted in an ascending trend for a number of detected diseases per 1 worker (p = 0.0015). We also revealed that workers who maintained oil-extracting machinery ran the greatest health risks as they had to spend the greatest amount of time outdoors (on average, 27 hours out of 40 hours per 1 working week) during a cold season. Besides, our research showed that exposure to cold potentiated adverse impacts exerted by other occupation factors on workers' health. Thus, given the same amount of time spent outdoors during a cold season for different occupational groups, welders ran the greatest risks of circulatory system diseases (AR = 2.0), ear and mastoid diseases (AR = 5.0), digestive organs diseases (AR = 2.2) due to the air at their working places being contaminated with welding aerosol. When working tasks are performed outdoors in regions with cold climate, it leads to elevated risks of chronic health disorders that occur due to long-term occupational exposure to uncontrollable meteorological factors and simultaneous air contamination with welding aerosols.