The individual characteristics of thermoregulation in oil production workers exposed to cooling meteorological factors

Introduction. To prevent health disorders under the influence of cooling meteorological factors of open production sites, the assessment of the individual characteristics of the employee’s thermoregulation is of particular importance.

The purpose of the study was to describe the individual characteristics of thermoregulation of employees of an oil producing enterprise when working in open production sites during the cold season.

Materials and methods. We studied the employees of the oil-producing enterprise of Western Siberia, performing labour operations in open production sites during the cold season (operators, process plant machinists, repairmen). An assessment of general and local violations of thermoregulation of the body of workers was carried out using objective assessment methods (assessment of the thermal state of the body in seventy six people, skin thermometry with cold load — 54 people) according to approved methods. The duration of work in the open area of the workers included in the study ranged from 12 to 31 hours during a 40-hour work week.

Results. According the assessment of the thermal state of workers, in 18.8% of workers, the personal indicators for assessing the thermal state were found to fail to correspond to the recommended values in the guidelines. Evaluation of the results of skin thermometry with a cold load in workers performing labour operations in open production sites under cooling conditions of the cold season of the year made it possible to establish the average values of temperature indicators in the study group to indicate the presence of initial signs of violations of the thermal control of the body and neurocirculatory disorders in the hands and fingers. An assessment of individual characteristics showed general and local violations of thermoregulation to be associated with the duration of work at open production sites, the objective indicators of local violations of thermoregulation were additionally affected by the employee’s smoking habit and work experience.

Limitations. Significant time costs for assessing the general and local thermoregulation of the employees of the enterprise and distracting them from performing labor operations during the shift can be attributed to the limitations of the methodology.

Conclusion. For the first time, the revealed features of thermoregulation in oil production workers in Western Siberia made it possible to develop targeted medical and preventive measures.

Compliance with ethical standards. The study with the participation of volunteers was approved by the Local Ethics Committee of North-Western State Medical University named after I.I. Mechnikov (Protocol of November 22, 2017, No.12).

Patient consent. Each participant of the study (or his/her legal representative) gave informed voluntary written consent to participate in the study and publish personal medical information in an impersonal form in the journal "Gigiena i Sanitariya (Hygiene and Sanitation, Russian journal)".

Contribution:
Meltser A.V. — concept and research design, choice of analytical methods, data collection and processing, writing the text, editing, approval of the final version of the article;
Polyakova E.M. — literature review, data collection and processing, database creation, analysis of the results obtained, statistical analysis, writing the text of the article, responsibility for the integrity of all parts of the article;
Syurin S.A. — literary review, editing.
All authors are responsible for the integrity of all parts of the manuscript and approval of the manuscript final version. 

Conflict of interest. The authors declare no conflict of interest. 

Acknowledgement. The study had no sponsorship. 

Received: September 16, 2022 / Accepted: December 8, 2022 / Published: January 12, 2023