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Exposure assessment
Original research
Dose–response relationship between hand–arm vibration exposure and vibrotactile thresholds among roadworkers
  1. Thomas Clemm1,
  2. Karl Færden2,
  3. Bente Ulvestad1,
  4. Lars-Kristian Lunde3,
  5. Karl-Christian Nordby1
  1. 1 Department of Occupational Medicine and Epidemiology, Statens arbeidsmiljoinstitutt, Oslo, Norway
  2. 2 Department of Environmental and Occupational Medicine, Oslo University Hospital, Oslo, Norway
  3. 3 Department of Work Psychology and Physiology, Statens arbeidsmiljoinstitutt, Oslo, Norway
  1. Correspondence to Dr Thomas Clemm, Department of Occupational Medicine and Epidemiology, Statens arbeidsmiljoinstitutt, Oslo, Norway; thomas.clemm{at}outlook.com

Abstract

Background Testing of vibration perception threshold (VPT) at the fingertips as a quantitative measure of tactile sensitivity is a commonly used tool in diagnosing hand–arm vibration syndrome. There is limited research on dose–response relationships between hand–arm vibration (HAV) exposure and VPT on an individual level.

Aims Assess possible dose–response relationships on an individual level between HAV exposure and VPT at the fingertips.

Methods We assessed average daily vibration exposure (m/s2A8) and cumulative lifetime HAV exposure for 104 participants from different departments in a road maintenance company based on vibration measurements and questionnaires. VPT was measured based on the technical method described in ISO 13091-1:2005 using octave frequencies 8–500 Hz. We investigated associations using linear regression models with significance level p≤0.05.

Results The participants were either exposed to rock drills (n=33), impact wrenches (n=52) or none of these tools (n=19). Exposure to rock drills and impact wrenches was associated with elevated VPT for all seven test frequencies in the second and fifth fingers of both hands. A dose–response with the daily exposure measure m/s2(A8) was found based on 1.2 m/s2(A8) for impact wrenches, and 5.4 m/s2(A8) for rock drills. A stronger association was found with the cumulative exposure for rock drills compared with impact wrenches, and for the second finger compared with the fifth finger.

Conclusions HAV exposure was associated with elevated VPT, also at exposure levels below the common exposure action value of 2.5 m/s2(A8). Lowering the HAV exposure can contribute to prevent increasing VPTs in these workers.

  • vibration
  • construction
  • occupational health practice
  • hygiene / occupational hygiene
  • neurophysiology
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.

https://doi.org/10.1136/oemed-2019-105926

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    Footnotes

    • Contributors TC: project design, data collection, data interpretation, draft writing, revising and approval of final document. KF, BU: project design, data collection, data interpretation, revising and approval of final document. LKL: project design, data interpretation, revising and approval of final document. KCN: project design, data collection, data interpretation, revising and approval of final document, and supervising.

    • Funding The RVO-fond (Regional Safety Representatives fund) helped finance the study.

    • Disclaimer The RVO-fond did not play any role in the study design; in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data; in the writing of the report; or in the decision to submit the paper for publication.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Patient consent for publication Not required.

    • Ethics approval Ethical Research Committee of South-East Norway (approval number 2013/1031).

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

    • Data availability statement Data are available upon reasonable request. Data are stored as deidentified participant data.