Abstract:
This research is to study the relationship between personal factors, work factors and
concentration of respirable dust and inhalable dust with respiratory symptoms of rice mill employees. The
sample consisted of 101 employees who worked in the production process. Most of them were male employees
(86.1%). The average working age was 10.86±7.92 years. Respiratory protection equipment was used (60.4%).
The warehouse department has a exposure to respirable dust maximum is 4.105 mg/m3
and mill/
polishing exposure to inhalable dust at 12.768 mg/m3
. The pulmonary function showed 47.5% of all
abnormalities, obstructive type 2.0% Restrictive type 44.6%, mixed type 1.0%. When studying relationships
found that risk factors (Gender, age, status, smoking, congenital diseases, work experience and respirable dust)
were significantly related to lung function at the level of 0.05 (p = 0.012, p = 0.001, p = 0.02, p = 0.005,
p = 0.045 p = 0.000 and p = 0.001). Symptoms of the respiratory system it was found that of the employees had
nasal congestion 39.6%, phlegm 30.7%, cough 28.7%, chest tightness, 21.8% and wheez 4.0%. Found that the
symptoms of phlegm were related with the congenital diseases, relative humidity respirable dust and inhalable
dust with statistical significance at the level of 0.05 (p = 0.018, p = 0.047, p = 0.009 p = 0.024 and p = 0.002).
Chest tightness is related with the section. and respirable dust, with statistical significance at the level of 0.05
(p = 0.020 and p = 0.024). wheez is related with the congenital diseases and work experience with statistical
significance at the level of 0.05 (p = 0.000 and 0.013) and nasal congestion were related with gender, wearing
respiratory protection equipment and section with statistical significance at the level of 0.05 (p = 0.042,
p = 0.045 and p = 0.006). Therefore, there should be surveillance and examination of lung function annually.
There should be measures to strictly control the wearing of respiratory protective equipment. There should be
health promotion activities for employees, including the campaign to stop smoking and the arrangement of
resting areas for employees from the production area.