Prevalence of occupational asthma among animal feed factory workers in Konya

Aim: To determine respiratory symptoms and alterations in respiratory functions due to exposure to animal feed dust and to detect the prevalence of occupational asthma in animal feed factory workers. Materials and Methods: A face to face questionnaire was applied to workers of 15 animal feed factories who have been exposed to animal feed dust and to employees of same factories who have not been exposed to animal feed dust, in Konya. Respiratory functions test were performed to all cases at the workplace by a portable spirometry. Skin prick test was applied to cases with asthma symptoms. Results: 139 workers and 61 control groups were enrolled to the study. The prevalence of occupational asthma was 19.4% in workers. The frequency of wheezing (25.1%), dyspnea (22.3%) and cough (18.7%) were higher in workers, but the difference was not significant. Although not significant the respiratory functions were lesser in workers compared to the control group. In workers group the frequent atopy symptoms were watery eyes (7.9%), sneezing (6.4%) and nasal discharge (3.5%), but not significantly diffetent than the control group. Wheezing was significantly more frequent in smoker workers than non smokers and respiratory functions were significantly lower in smokers. Skin prick test was positive in 10 (23.8%) of 42 cases who had symptom, but no significant difference was present between cases with asthma and other workers. Respiratory symptoms and respiratory functions were not significantly different between workers who used a simple ventless dust mask and those without masks. Conclusion: Exposure to animal feed dust has important effects, on developing respiratory symptoms and decreasing respiratory functions as the duration of exposure. This effect is significantly greater in the case of smoking. There was no significant correlation between occupational asthma and atopy. The use of masks which do not have specified features has no satisfactory role in terms of protection