Respiratory symptoms among epoxy-exposed workers in the wind turbine industry: a cross-sectional study

OBJECTIVES: The aim was to estimate the prevalence and risk of respiratory symptoms among workers exposed to epoxy resin systems in the wind turbine industry.

METHODS: We conducted a cross-sectional study including 180 epoxy-exposed production workers from two Danish wind turbine blade factories and 41 non-exposed office workers. Respiratory symptoms were defined as having two or more symptoms (i.e. wheezing in chest, waking up with chest tightness, shortness of breath, attack of coughing, or asthma attack) within the last 12 mo. Epoxy exposure was defined as exposure status (epoxy-exposed production worker or non-exposed office worker) and years of epoxy-exposure (years of employment as production worker). Epoxy skin sensitization status was obtained through a patch-test. The association between epoxy-exposure and respiratory symptoms was estimated using modified Poisson regression (prevalence ratio (PR)) adjusting for smoking and age.

RESULTS: A total of 13.3% of the epoxy-exposed production workers and 4.9% of non-exposed office workers reported two or more respiratory symptoms (PRadj=1.8, 95% CI 0.4-9.5). For years of exposure, PRadj values were 1.2 (<1 yr), 1.0 (≥1-<5 yr), and 2.6 (≥5 yr). Higher PRadj were found among men. Epoxy-sensitized production workers had a PRadj of 0.4, while non-sensitized workers had a PRadj of 1.9, compared to non-exposed office workers.

CONCLUSION: Epoxy-exposed production workers showed a tendency to report respiratory symptoms more often than non-exposed office workers. However, we found no clear association between exposure duration and symptoms. Further studies are highly warranted to evaluate the potential association between epoxy exposure and respiratory symptoms.