Occupational Noise Exposure and Serum Lipids in Manufacturing Company Workers

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: The study aimed to examine the relationship between occupational cumulative noise exposure and serum lipids as risk factor of ischemic heart disease. METHODS: Participants (n=1,175) were workers of the steel product manufacturing factory exposed to more than 85 dB(A) of noise. We collected ambient noise and other materials monitoring data in workplace, laboratory test, and structured-questionnaires. Occupational noise exposure was defined as cumulative noise exposure calculated by duration of exposure and level of exposure. Serum lipids were total cholesterol, triglyceride, low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol, and total cholesterol/HDL cholesterol. We examined the relationship between serum lipids and occupational noise exposure. RESULTS: In a noise exposure environment, 657 people (56.8%) worked for more than 10 years. Cumulative noise exposure increased significantly as exposure duration and noise level increased. Cumulative noise exposure were related to total cholesterol (P=0.001), LDL cholesterol (P=0.002), total cholesterol/HDL cholesterol (P=0.005) in correlation analysis. We conducted multiple linear regression analysis using the serum lipids and significant variables including cumulative noise exposure. We identified that total cholesterol was significantly related to cumulative noise exposure (β=0.072). CONCLUSION: We propose occupational cumulative noise exposure may be significantly related to total cholesterol.