Many Korean bus drivers work long hours, which causes fatigue and increased risk of accidents during driving. Their fatigue due to long working hours may cause a significant accident accompanied by injuries of the general population. The present study aimed to evaluate the fatigue and accident risk in Korean commercial bus drivers. The subjects were 16 city and express bus drivers with various work schedules: 2 shifts (2 shifts in a day), WR (duty-off), W2R (duty-duty-off), and W4R2 (duty-duty-duty-duty-off-off). We measured the subjects' heart rate in their workplace during their work and calculated relative heart rate (RHR) and maximum acceptable work time (MAWT), the maximum amount of time for which workers can sustain their workload without physical fatigue. Fatigue and risk index, which is a tool for assessing the risk from fatigue in the safety critical workers, was calculated using the subjects' work schedule. RHR ranged from 9.7 to 21.8% and MAWT was shorter than each subject's actual work hours. Fatigue (45.2-54.4) and risk indices (1.8) were high in WR schedule, which were higher than recommended value (30-35 for fatigue index and < 1.6 for risk index). According to these findings, Korean bus drivers worked long hours beyond their physical abilities, and the fatigue and risk indices were high, especially in WR schedule. It is necessary to prepare the policies to reduce the fatigue and accident risk in the Korean bus drivers including regulation for bus drivers' driving time restriction.
= Abstract =Objectives: Farmers are known to be exposed to a variety of allergens related to the work environment.This study was conducted to determine the sensitization rates as well as South Korea that they are sensitized to certain allergens farmers through the skin prick test. Methods:By targeting a total of 1143 people living in the rural town of Gyeonggi Province, it was conducted a questionnaire containing demographic and occupational risk factors and underwent skin prick tests with 15 types of allergens(including positive and negative controls). Multivariable logistic regression analysis was used to analyze the association between occupational risk factors and skin prick test positivity.Results: Except for the 30 people whose result is invalid, positive rate of the skin prick test was 18.6% in 1,113 people. The species of house dust mite, Dermatophagoides pteronyssinus and Dermatophagoides farinae was the highest at 8.7% and 8.6%. After adjusted by age, gender, smoking and education level, odds ratio of flower plant farmers is 4.467(95% CI: 2.094-9.527) and fruit farmer is 2.275(95% CI: 1.096-4.721).In addition, the rate of sensitization to grass pollen mixture of the flower plant farmers is significantly higher(15.9%, p<0.001) than other allergens. Conclusions:Even farmers, the rate of sensitization to allergens related to the general environment, such as house dust mite is relatively dominant. However, given the presence of potential cross-reactivity between the allergens or distribution showed that the unique aspects of allergen sensitization in the flower growers, occupational cause is not be completely ruled out.
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