Pain and clinical findings in the low back: a study of industrial employees with 5-, 10-, and 28-year follow-ups.

Little is known about the relationships of clinical findings in the low back with low back pain (LBP) in the normal working population. We studied whether physiotherapist's findings in the low back were associated with local and radiating LBP among a cohort (n=902) of employees in the engineering industry. A systematic non-proportional sample was drawn in strata by age, gender, and occupational class.

Long-term exposure and health-related quality of life among patients with occupational rhinitis.

Objective: This article evaluates health-related quality of life (HRQoL) among patients with occupational rhinitis (OR), with an average of 10 years after diagnosis.

Methods: A cross-sectional questionnaire with general (RAND-36) and disease-specific (Rhinasthma) HRQoL questions was completed by 119 OR patients and 173 controls of the same age and locality. In addition, the patients compared their estimation of current occupational exposure level with that at the time of OR diagnosis.