Health Risk Assessment from Dust Exposure in Sorting Process of Sanitary Ware

Abstract

          This study aims to assess the health risk from dust exposure in Sorting process of the sanitary ware industry. The
study comprised 1) interviewing of the operators and 2) air sampling for determining the respirable dust concentrations at
the study areas 3) analyze all information to assess the health risk of the operators before and after improvement from
the ventilation system to the water curtain booth and the water grinding machine. The result of average concentration of
the respirable dust before the improvement was 1.025 mg/m3 and after the improvement, the concentration of respirable
dust was 0.698 mg/m3. The results showed that before and after improvement of the ventilation system and wearing a
respirator mask could reduce hazard index (HI) less than 1 for all operators. In addition, health risk assessment also includes
the age of the operators reach to 60 years-old between both before and after safety condition improvement. It was found
that all operators have the hazardous index > 1 due to the exposure to respirable dust when none of the safety improvement
was provided. In the case of the operator wearing a dust mask during working with none of the ventilation improvement,
22.06% and 16.63% of the operators in the Sorting unit and QA unit, respectively had the health risk with the HI > 1. Finally, it indicates that in the case of the working area was improved and the operators wear the respirator masks
throughout the duration of working until the age of 60 years old, all operators will not have the health risk of receiving
the health hazards from exposure to respirable dust (HI < 1).