A 4-Year Follow-up Cohort Study of the Respiratory Functions in Toner-handling Workers

BACKGROUND: Focusing on the respiratory function for health effect indices, we conducted a cross-sectional study on workers who did and did not handle toner to compare the longitudinal changes. METHODS: Among 116 individuals who worked for a Japanese business equipment manufacturer and participated in the study, the analysis included 69 male workers who we were able to follow up for 4 years. We categorized the 40 workers engaged in toner-handling work as the exposed group and the 29 workers not engaged in these tasks as the referent group, and compared their respiratory function test results: peak expiratory flow rate (PEFR), vital capacity (VC), predicted vital capacity (%VC), forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV(1)), and forced expiratory volume in 1 second as a percent of forced vital capacity (FEV(1)%). RESULTS: The cross-sectional study of the respiratory function test results at the baseline and at the 5(th) year showed no statistically significant differences in PEFR, VC, %VC, FEV(1), and FEV(1)% between the exposed and referent workers. Also, respiratory function time-course for 4 years was calculated and compared between the groups. No statistically significant differences were shown. CONCLUSION: Our study does not suggest any toner exposure effects on respiratory function. However, the number of subjects was small in our study; studies of larger populations will be desired in the future.