• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.286-292
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• 2016

Objectives: This study aimed to evaluate the effects of chronical exposure to high-level dusts on cellular immune function. Methods: The subjects were 110 male workers, among whom 60 were chronically exposed to high-level dusts in mica, limestone and iron mines. The remaining 50 were office workers. Ambient total, respirable dust and crystalline silica in the workplace were sampled using personal air samplers and analyzed according to NIOSH method 0500. Serum levels of hydrogen peroxide, lipid peroxide and superoxide misutase activity were measured using absorption chromatography. The subpopulations of CD4+, CD8+, natural killer cells (CD16+) and CD3+ T-lymphocytes were examined by two-color staining using monoclonal antibodies. Results: The concentration of hydrogen peroxide was significantly higher in exposed workers and superoxide dismutase activity was significantly higher in control workers. No significant difference in numbers of T-lymphocyte subpopulations were observed between exposed and control workers. A significant correlation in exposed workers was observed among total dusts, respirable dusts and crystalline silica. Hydrogen peroxide was significantly correlated with total dust (r=0.720, p<0.01), respirable dust (r=0.770, p<0.01) and crystalline silica (r=0.678, p<0.01). Concentration of hydrogen peroxide showed a significantly negative correlation with numbers of CD8+ cells (r=-0.274, p<0.01), CD3+ cells (r=-0.222, p<0.01) and natural killer cells (r=-0.556, p<0.01). Conclusions: These results suggest that chronical exposure to high-level dust affects cellular immune function and effects might mediate through reactive oxygen species and inflammatory response.

• Fire Science and Engineering
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• v.28 no.6
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• pp.90-98
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• 2014

Lately accidents of harmful chemical substance in korea were repeatedly replaying. We studied problems and preparation plan in 2008 years~2014 years through analysis cases of harmful chemical substance. Leakage of chemical substance's accident situation shows that leakage in the workplace is the most 10 cases, accounting for 58.6% is the largest proportion in 2009. Leakage according to explosion accounting for 50% (5 cases) in 2004, 25% (4 cases) in 2007 and 33.3% (4 cases) in 2011 has very irregular change. Therefore, A major cause of accidents is lack of safety management. Harmful chemical substance showed various aspects, high residual substance and non-visible characteristic so response and recovery was easy. And the second damage to move a distance causes environment pollution. So a mutual-assistance system and integrated system of related organization have to build and expert of chemical incident response and therapist of chemical substance response have to establish to do efficient and rapid response.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.166-174
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• 2018

Objectives: This study aimed to estimate the number and proportion of target workplaces for work environment monitoring and evaluate the implementation rate of work environment monitoring. Methods: A questionnaire survey was conducted by the Ministry of Employment and Labor between March and May 2017 among 96,295 manufacturing businesses with more than five employees. The response rate was 17.8%. Estimates of the number and proportion of target workplaces for work environment monitoring were calculated as follows: number of workplaces where work environment monitoring was performed in 2016 + exposure rate based on the questionnaire * number of workplaces where work environment monitoring was not conducted. Results: Of the 150,655 total manufacturing businesses with more than five employees, 63,146 are estimated to be subject to work environment monitoring, which accounted for 41.9% of the workplaces. It is estimated that 73.3% of the target workplaces performed work environment monitoring. The number of workers exposed to hazardous substances is estimated to be about 0.7~1.2 million. Conclusions: Information on the distribution of workplaces subject to work environment monitoring and the rate of implementation can be used as baseline information for management and evaluation of the effectiveness of the work environment monitoring system.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.185-195
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• 2020

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to analyze noise exposure levels and the rate of exceedance of exposure limits in workplaces from a 2015 measurement of working environments according to area, industry, and scale of workplace and to determine changes compared to the past. Methods: Among the 408,875 measurements of noise in working environments from 27,030 workplaces in 2015, 16,359 workplaces that were linked to special health examination data were selected as the subjects of this study. The eight-hour corrected measurements and geometric mean values of the individual noise measurements of the workplaces were used to calculate noise exposure levels and the exceedance rate of exposure limits. Results: The average noise exposure level of the overall workplaces making up the subjects of this study was 83.6 dBA, and the exceedance rate of exposure limits was 15.1%. At least half of the noise measurements exceeded the exposure limits in 13.7% of the workplaces. Noise exposure levels were higher in the manufacturing industry and in smaller-scale workplaces. The exceedance rate of noise exposure limits was higher in the mining and manufacturing industries and in smaller-scale workplaces. Conclusions: Noise exposure has shown improvements compared to the past, but the exceedance rate of exposure limits was still high, and more than half of the workers were being exposed to noise of 85 dBA or higher. Therefore, it is necessary to make more active improvements in working environments in terms of noise exposure.

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• v.38 no.4
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• pp.234-236
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• 2013

Some of radioactive contamination is unavoidable in the facilities using the unsealed radioactive material. The primary purpose of radioactive contamination control in the workplace with contamination concern is the effects from the potential intake of radioactive material into the body. This paper provides procedures to estimate the level of internal exposure for the worker based on the conservative assumptions and simple calculations. They consist of two processes; to calculate air concentration of radioactive material and annual intake by inhalation with contaminated air and to compare each of them to Derived Air Concentration and Annual Limit on Intake mentioned in the related notification. The procedures are applicable to make a decision on practical requirements for monitoring air contamination and internal exposure of worker as follows; needs for measurement of air contamination and internal exposure and acquisition of information on the design of the ventilation system.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.1-7
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• 2014

To protect the workers' health, we evaluated the hazards of gasoline which the large amounts of use and lack of information, and perform the risk assessment through the measurement of working environment. It is estimated the reproductive toxicity, and has germ cell mutagenicity class 1B, also IARC 2B, ACGIH A3 with carcinogenicity. With working environment, it is measured as below the TLV-TWA $900mg/m^3$. It is also calculated $0.3mg/m^3$ as carcinogenicity RfC (worker), $2.7mg/m^3$ as chronic inhalation toxicity RfC (worker), $2.7mg/m^3$ as developmental toxicity RfC (worker). From all of these results, it is calculated that the risks are 459, 51 and 51 as carcinogenicity, chronic inhalation toxicity and developmental toxicity, respectively. It is concluded that the risk of gasoline is evaluated over 1.

• Journal of the Ergonomics Society of Korea
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.19-28
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• 2011

Objective: The aim of this study is to reclassify human errors and to develop hands-on tools to apply the new classification for preventing human error accidents in highway construction site. Background: The main cause of accidents in highway construction was reported as the carelessness of workers. However, such diagnosis could not help us operationally prevent accidents in real workplace. Method: The accidents in highway construction were reanalyzed and the causes of human error were reclassified in order to educate and improve the awareness of human error in highway construction. Field survey and interview with safety managers and workers were conducted to find the causal relationship between the actual accidents and the human errors. Results: The most frequently observed human errors in highway construction were classified into six categories such as mis-perception, distraction, memory fail, slip, cognition error and mis-judgment. In order to provide hands-on tools to increase the awareness of human error in construction field, the human error checklist and card sorting diary were developed. Especially, the card sorting diary was designed to increase the ability in human error inspection of safety manager at construction site. Moreover, posters were developed based on actual accident cases. Conclusion: We suggested that the improved awareness and analytical report on checklist, card sorting diary and posters for construction field could collectively prevent the accident. Application: The classification of human error, hands-on tools and posters can be directly applicable on highway construction site. This analytical and collective approach preventing human error-related accident could be extended to other construction workplaces.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.135-142
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• 1996

Prolonged in-plant personnel exposure to high noise levels results in permant hearing damage. There are no way to correct this hearing damage by treatment or use of hearing aids. Therefore, every employer is responsible for providing a workplace free of such hazards as excessive noise. This study was carried out to evalute and predict a given noise environment based on specific limit as the noise guarantee for a newly-founded petrochemical plant. The maximum total sound level should not exceed 85dBA in the work area, except where the area is defined as a restricted area and 70dBA at the plant boundary. Prediction of the noise levels within the plant area for a newly-founded petrochemical plant was achieved by dividing all plant area into 20m$\times$20m regular grid spaces and noise level inside the area or unit that in-plant personel exposure to high noise levels was estimated computed into 5m$\times$5m regular grid spaces. The noise level at the grid point that was propagated from each of the noise sources(equipments) computed using the methematical formula was defined as follows : $SPL_2$=$SPL_1-20log{\frac{r_2}{r_1}}$(dB) where $SPL_1$ =sound pressure level at distance $r_1$ from the source $SPL_2$=sound pressure level at distance $r_2$ from the source As a result, the equipments exceeded noise limit or irritaring noise levels were identified on the specific grid coordinates. As for equipments in the area that show high noise levels, appropriate counter-measures for noise control (by barriers, enclosure, silencers, or the change of equipments, for example) should be reviewed. Methods for identifying sources of noise applied in this study should be the model for prediction of the noise levels for any newly-founded plant.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Information and Communication Engineering
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.97-102
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• 2019

Disaster accidents at industrial sites have been increasing every year. In shipyards there are countless enclosed spaces causing issues like harmful-toxic gases stuck in those sealed areas. And due to such special and complicated structures of the working places with many layers of walls separating each other, there exist more issues of communication with workers trapped inside when accidents happen. Under this circumstance there must be a huge difficulty to evacuate or rescue the workers in case of any disaster. Therefore, in this paper, We would like to introduce the "integrated safety system" to more effectively deal with the problems and prevent such disasters in tough working environments. The suggested integrated safety system can prevent accidents in advance because it can control the data on the location of the workers in real time and the numerical values such as gas, oxygen, and carbon dioxide generated in the workplace in real time.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.195-207
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• 2019

Objectives: This study was performed to confirm whether plasma lead can be used as a chronic biomarker for the biological monitoring of exposure to lead. Methods: Lead concentrations in 66 plasma samples from retired lead workers (G.M. 60.25 years, Median 61.00 years) and 42 plasma samples from the general population (G.M. 53.76 years, Median 56.50 years) were measured using ICP/Mass. Tibia, whole blood, hemoglobin, hematocrit, and blood zinc protophorphyrin (ZPP) concentrations and urinary ${\delta}$-aminolevulinic acid (${\delta}-ALA$) were measured for correlation analysis with plasma lead. Results: The geometric mean concentration of lead in plasma was $0.23{\mu}g/L$ for the retired lead workers and $0.10{\mu}g/L$ for the general population sample. A simple correlation analysis of biomarkers showed that plasma lead concentration among the retired lead workers was highly correlated with lead concentration in the tibia and with blood lead concentration, and the plasma lead concentration among the general population correlated with ZPP concentration in the blood. The lead concentration in the tibia and the lead concentration in the whole blood increased with length of working period. As the period in the lead workplace increased, the ratio of lead in plasma to lead concentration in whole blood decreased. Conclusion: This study confirmed the possibility of a chronic biomarker of lead concentration in blood plasma as a biomarker. In the future, comparative studies with specific indicators will lead to more fruitful results.