[Neighbourhood noise pollution in housing].

NEIGHBOURHOOD NOISE POLLUTION IN HOUSING. The discomfort caused by environmental noise in home living space is very frequently observed in our time, its consequences are underestimated. The genesis of this nuisance lies in the poor quality of buildings, which are subject to a series of regulations and obligations that are often not respected, as well as incivism and non-compliance with Public Health Code decrees governing noise emissions from various activities.

Wellbeing and occupational risk perception among health care workers: a multicenter study in Morocco and France.

Background: The study analyzes health care workers' (HCWs) occupational risk perception and compares exposure to occupational risk factors in Moroccan and French hospitals.

Method: Across nine public hospitals from three Moroccan regions (north, center and south), a 49 item French questionnaire, based on the Job Content Questionnaire, and 4 occupational risks subscales, was distributed to 4746 HCWs. Internal consistency of the study was determined for each subscale.

Chronic low back pain among French healthcare workers and prognostic factors of return to work (RTW): a non-randomized controlled trial.

Background: Many factors influence the return to work of workers with chronic low back pain (CLBP). They have been said to vary according to socio-professional group. This study first aimed to compare prognostic factors influencing the return to work of CLBP healthcare workers (HCWs) and other workers (non-HCWs) after rehabilitation coupled with an occupational intervention.

Psychosocial and occupational risk perception among health care workers: a Moroccan multicenter study.

Background: International studies on occupational risks in public hospitals are infrequent and only few researchers have focused on psychosocial stress in Moroccan Health Care Workers (HCWs). The aim of this study was to present and analyze Moroccan HCWs occupational risk perception. Across nine public hospitals from three Moroccan regions (northern, central and southern), a 49 item French questionnaire with 4 occupational risks subscales, was distributed to 4746 HCWs.

Stress perception among employees in a French University Hospital.

Background: Nantes University Hospital comprises 20 activity sectors.

Aims: To investigate the role of the work environment at the individual level, as well as the workplace level, in explaining the variability in employees' perception of stress.

Methods: A self-administered enhanced Karasek Job Content Questionnaire was sent to employees.

Relevance of both individual risk factors and occupational exposure in cancer survival studies: the example of intestinal type sinonasal adenocarcinoma.

Objectives/hypothesis: Wood dust is a well-established risk factor for intestinal type sinonasal adenocarcinoma. The 5-year overall survival has varied from 20% to 80% according T1-T4 stages; 5-year survival according to histologic subtype has varied from 20% to 50%. To date, no study has evaluated whether environmental, occupational, and personal risk factors have any impact on both overall and cancer-specific survival.

[Contribution of occupational medicine to social medicine].

Occupational medicine has always been part of social medicine, but focuses on the part of the population in paid employment. Investigations of occupational diseases have identified several toxic chemicals that can affect other sectors of society: examples include cancers due to sawdust, asbestos, benzene, as well as carcinogens, mutagens and reproductive toxins. Better knowledge of the risks posed by epoxy resins, cements, formaldehyde, lead, toluene and other chemical agents has helped to understand certain diseases in the population.

Occupational diseases due to cooling fluids.

Contact dermatitis to cutting fluids is a very frequent cause of occupational skin disease, with different mechanisms for those caused by irritation or allergies. The different allergens in question are many and complex. Different batteries of patch tests are available but the interpretation of the relevance of positive tests is not simple.

Evaluation of the tuberculin skin test and the interferon-gamma release assay for TB screening in French healthcare workers.

Introduction: Using French cut-offs for the Tuberculin Skin Test (TST), results of the TST were compared with the results of an Interferon-gamma Release Assay (IGRA) in Healthcare Workers (HCW) after contact to AFB-positive TB patients.

Methods: Between May 2006 and May 2007, a total of 148 HCWs of the University Hospital in Nantes, France were tested simultaneously with IGRA und TST. A TST was considered to indicate recent latent TB infection (LTBI) if an increase of >10 mm or if TST >/= 15 mm for those with no previous TST result was observed.

Gene expression profiling in sinonasal adenocarcinoma.

Background: Sinonasal adenocarcinomas are uncommon tumors which develop in the ethmoid sinus after exposure to wood dust. Although the etiology of these tumors is well defined, very little is known about their molecular basis and no diagnostic tool exists for their early detection in high-risk workers.

Methods: To identify genes involved in this disease, we performed gene expression profiling using cancer-dedicated microarrays, on nine matched samples of sinonasal adenocarcinomas and non-tumor sinusal tissue.

[How to test occupational products brought in by patients].

Where allergic investigations are carried out for occupational dermatitis, appropriate tests must be performed but commercially available batteries are not always suitable for the working conditions and for the products handled by patients. During testing, the products being handled must thus be correctly diluted with full knowledge of their composition in order to prevent harmful effects, particularly caustic effects, and to avoid false positives and false negatives.

Occupational dermatitis to epoxydic and phenolic resins.

Contact dermatitis to epoxydic and phenolic resins are the most frequent contact dermatoses due to plastics, in particular in the form of airborne dermatitis. The chemical formulas of the various components of these resins and their additives are complex and the patch tests available in the trade are insufficient and often arrive at a late stage in the progress of industry, in particular in advanced technologies like aeronautical engineering, shipbuilding or the new floor and wall coverings in buildings. This article is a review of the actions to be taken with these allergies, as well as with regards to their diagnosis, prevention and medico-legal compensation.

[Contact allergy to antiseptics: 75 cases analyzed by the dermato-allergovigilance network (Revidal)].

Aim: To determine the clinical features of contact dermatitis caused by antiseptics and to ascertain whether the substance responsible is the antiseptic itself or the excipients.

Patients And Methods: A multicenter, retrospective study based on analysis of all cases reported over a 2-year period to the Dermato-Allergology Vigilance network known as Revidal. Each dossier contained details of the clinical characteristics of lesions, the incriminated antiseptic, the mode of exposure and the results of patch tests done with the antiseptic in question.

Brain magnetic resonance imaging, aerobic power, and metabolic parameters among 30 asymptomatic scuba divers.

The aim of the study was to evaluate the presence of cerebral lesions in asymptomatic scuba divers and explain the causes of them: potential risk factors associating cardiovascular risk factors, low aerobic capacity, or characteristics of diving (maximum depth, ascent rate). Experienced scuba divers, over 40 years of age, without any decompression sickness (DCS) history were included. We studied 30 scuba divers (instructors) without any clinical symptoms.

[Prevention of occupational dermatitis].

The prevention of the occupational skin disease is essential to avoid some clinical complications and to preserve job. The suppression of the responsible factor is rarely possible at work, but when it is possible, it is efficient. The practice of real orders of prevention is the best way to proceed, writing individual and collective prevention prescriptions, which have to be very precise and adapted to every case during one sufficient time to get a good adherence of the patients.

[Occupational dermatitis in the agriculture-food industry environment].

The agricultural and food professions are those that touch agriculture, but also the restoration, the kitchens, and the employees of slaughterhouses. Various occupational skin diseases touch these salaried employees or craftsmen: eczemas or contact hives with plants or meats and fleshes of animals and all chemical substances that are added: pesticides, food additives and various preservatives. Irritation contact dermatitis or real skin burns are observed with housekeeping products imposed by the sanitary norms, increasingly powerful, but as increasingly caustic.

'Airborne' contact dermatitis due to Leica immersion oil.

Background: Contact dermatitis has often been described in healthcare staff, resulting essentially from the use of natural rubber latex gloves, antiseptics, and especially aldehydes. This study reports an unusual cause of contact dermatitis in laboratory technicians.

Materials And Methods: Four patients working in the bacteriology departments of three different hospitals were seen for airborne contact dermatitis.

[Respiratory allergies among symptomatic bakers and pastry cooks: initial results of a prevalence study].

A survey was carried out on respiratory symptoms and skin prick response to common allergens, storage mite and occupational allergens. Among 178 symptomatics bakers and pastry workers from small businesses in western France, only 65 people underwent skin prick and specific-IgE. 12 (18%) workers were skin positive to at least one common or occupational allergens.

[Respiratory allergies among bakers and pastry cooks: epidemiologic survey done in 1991 by the occupational physicians of the Loire-Atlantique].

The aim was to study the prevalence of respiratory allergy (rhinitis and asthma) in a population of bakers and pastrycooks. In 1991, 485 bakers and pastry cooks were examined by 27 work-physicians of Loire-Atlantic. The investigation was composed of a standardised questionnaire (signs of respiratory function, atopic history, smoking of tobacco .

Streptococcus suis meningitis. A severe noncompensated occupational disease.

Meningitis caused by Streptococcus suis type 2, a rare disease first recognized in 1968 (108 cases worldwide in 1989), is contracted by occupational exposure to pigs and often results in very severe disabilities (definitive deafness and ataxia in 50% of cases). We report the case of an employee in a rendering plant whose initial symptom was deafness. A detailed analysis of medical and veterinary literature is provided concerning the epidemiology of the disease, the clinical forms in man, bacteriological diagnosis and the role of the pig as healthy carrier.