Assessment of Cardiac Cost of Two Age Groups of Brick Carriers During Summer in Different Unorganized Brick making Sector in West Bengal, India

Abstract

In brick making industry, brick carrying activity requires extreme physical efforts and imposes additional load on cardiovascular system of the workers in hot environment. Lack of data about age associated alteration of cardiac cost among the brick carriers impinged us for this study. The purpose of this study was to assess the cardiac cost of two age groups of brick carriers in summer seasons. 156 brick carriers, having minimum one years experiences, were divided into two groups i.e., younger carriers and older carriers. Anthropometric parameters along with different cardiac indices were calculated with Polar Heart-Rate Monitor. The wet bulb globe temperature (WBGT out ) index of the worksite was also measured. Group-wise comparison of cardiac indices and effect of age on those indices were performed using‗t'-test and correlation coefficients respectively adjusting for confounders. All cardiac parameters were positively correlated with one another except for average working HR with PREC, Relative CC and Net CC; Working HR max with PREC and Relative CC; and SRHB with Relative CC. It was seen that the brick carriers surpassed the recommended limits of cardiac strain indices like Net CC and Relative CC, especially with increasing age. This indicates the job used to -heavy‖ to -extremely heavy‖ in accordance with the cardiac parameters.

Ergonomic evaluation of physiological stress of building construction workers associated with manual material handling tasks

“…A similar study was conducted to assess the cardiac costs of male brick kiln workers of two different age groups [11], and it was observed that mean (SD) Maximum Heart Rate (HR max) of the younger group (18-39 years) was 142.55 (5.63) beats/min at higher WBGT. But this study showed that mean peak heart rate of the MMH workers was 147.0 (11.44) beats/min at lower WBGT.…”

“…Heavy load carriage, awkward postures for a prolonged duration, environmental stress, lack of usage of personal protective equipment are cumulatively affecting the health status of workers. Angular deviation of joint angles from neutral posture, continuous and speedy work pattern, and heavy load carriage can exert the cardiovascular load on the workers, and it enhances with increased environmental temperature and humidity [11,12].…”