Knee Disorders Among Carpenters in the St. Louis Area

Construction workers, especially carpenters, have a significant number of complaints about knee disorders. Thus, it is desired to identify incident cases of knee disorders and to examine the distribution of specific knee disorders. Clinically sensible algorithms were developed to investigate the medical claims data from the union health plan for carpenters in St. Louis. As a result, 4,900 incident cases of knee disorders were identified among 23,245 medical claims during 1998–2008 and the incidence rate was approximately 153 per 10,000 FTEs (Full-time equivalents). The distribution of knee disorders was 33.1% for acute, 37.1% for subacute, and 29.8% for chronic of the total cases. The majority of carpenters among the total incident cases were Outside Journeymen, who had a much higher percentage of osteoarthritis (32.6% of their total cases). However, it was also noteworthy that Floor Layer Journeymen were diagnosed with more bursitis (32.1%) and Outside Apprentices had a higher percentage of ACL (Anterior cruciate ligament) or PCL (Posterior cruciate ligament) sprain (13.6%) and fracture (10.9%). These results describe the characteristics of knee disorders among union carpenters and provide fundamental health outcome information for further study of knee disorders and occupational risk factors.