Paavo Jäppinen

Lack of Predictability at Work and Risk of Acute Myocardial Infarction: An 18-Year Prospective Study of Industrial Employees

OBJECTIVES We examined whether the distinctive components of job control-decision authority, skill discretion, and predictability-were related to subsequent acute myocardial infarction (MI) events in a large population of initially heart disease-free industrial employees. METHODS We prospectively examined the relation between the components of job control and acute MI among private-sector industrial employees. During an 18-year follow-up, 56 fatal and 316 nonfatal events of acute MI were documented among 7663 employees with no recorded history of cardiovascular disease at baseline (i.e., 1986). RESULTS After adjustment for demographics, psychological distress, prevalent medical conditions, lifestyle risk factors, and socioeconomic characteristics, low decision autonomy (P < .53) and skill discretion (P < .10) were not significantly related to subsequent acute MI. By contrast, low predictability at work was associated with elevated risk of acute MI (P = .02). This association was driven by the strong effect of predictability on acute MI among employees aged 45 to 54 years. CONCLUSIONS Prospective evidence suggests that low predictability at work is an important component of job control, increasing long-term risk of acute MI among middle-aged employees.

Managerial leadership is associated with employee stress, health, and sickness absence independently of the demand-control-support model.

OBJECTIVES Research on health effects of managerial leadership has only taken established work environment factors into account to a limited extent. We therefore investigated the associations between a measure of Attentive Managerial Leadership (AML), and perceived stress, age-relative self-rated health, and sickness absence due to overstrain/fatigue, adjusting for the dimensions of the Demand-Control-Support model. PARTICIPANTS Blue- and white-collar workers from Finland, Germany and Sweden employed in a multi-national forest industry company (N=12,622). METHODS Cross-sectional data on leadership and health from a company-wide survey analysed with logistic regression in different subgroups. RESULTS AML was associated with perceived stress, age-relative self-rated health, and sickness absence due to overstrain/fatigue after controlling for the Demand-Control-Support model. Lack of AML was significantly associated with a high stress level in all subgroups (OR=1.68-2.67). Associations with age-relative self-rated health and sickness absence due to overstrain/fatigue were weaker, but still significant, and in the expected direction for several of the subgroups studied, suggesting an association between lack of AML and negative health consequences. CONCLUSION The study indicates that managerial leadership is associated with employee stress, health, and sickness absence independently of the Demand-Control-Support model and should be considered in future studies of health consequences for employees, and in work environment interventions.

Genotoxicity of kraft pulp spent liquors from different types of chlorination procedures

The genotoxicity of spent liquors from kraft softwood and hardwood pulp bleaching processes was studied using the Ames Salmonella test and the SOS chromotest. The induction of micronuclei, in vivo, was assayed in bone marrow erythrocytes of B6 mice treated with softwood first chlorination stage spent liquor. The softwood bleaching process used a combination of Cl2 and ClO2 at the first chlorination stage. During the study the amount of free chlorine at the first chlorination stage in the softwood bleachery was gradually decreased, although the amount of active chlorine remained the same. Enzymatic bleaching was also used in a softwood process together with chlorine (Cl2 + ClO2). The hardwood bleaching plant used only ClO2 at the first chlorination stage. A decrease in genotoxicity, corresponding to the decrease in Cl2, was observed in the Ames Salmonella assays of the softwood bleaching plant effluents. A similar decrease was observed in the SOS chromotest. The highest decrease in mutagenic activity was observed when enzymatic bleaching was used together with chlorine.

Characterization and Control of Terpene Emissions in Finnish Sawmills

This article describes an experimental study of terpene emission rates during fresh pine and spruce sawing and processing. Total terpene emission was determined by summing the product of the exhaust airflow rate and the mean concentration in the exhaust. Terpene concentrations were measured at fixed sampling points between the sawing lines. Terpene emission during pine sawing was found to be around 10 times greater than that during spruce sawing. The emission rates given here can be used to predict emission rates for various production rates. The predicted emission rates can be used in mass balance models to predict concentrations or required airflow rates to achieve the target concentration level.

Exposure of Workers to 2,3,7,8-Substituted Polychlorinated Dibenzo-p-Dioxin (PCDD) and Dibenzofuran (PCDF) Compounds in Sawmills Previously Using Chlorophenol-Containing Antistain Agents

The use of chlorophenol-containing antistain agents (e.g., Ky5, a wood preservative) ceased in Finland at the end of the 1980s, after 5 decades of use. Exposure of workers to the impurities in these agents (i.e., polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins [PCDDs] and dibenzofurans [PCDFs]) was assessed at three sawmills at which personnel used a sodium chlorophenate product as an antistain agent. Given that compounds accumulate in body fat and their half-lives in humans are long, we could determine 2,3,7,8-substituted PCDDs and PCDFs 5-9 y after the last exposure occurred. We used high-resolution gas chromatography/high-resolution mass spectrometry to determine PCDDs/PCDFs in plasma from 39 Ky5-exposed workers and 18 nonexposed workers. The average total plasma concentration of PCDD/PCDF of the Ky5-exposed workers at the three sawmills were 1018, 945, and 1165 pg/g fat, and corresponding concentrations in the nonexposed workers were 743, 1124, and 844 pg/g fat, respectively. We found no significant differences in total levels between Ky5-exposed workers and nonexposed workers. However, concentrations of the 1,2,3,4,6,7,8-HpCDF isomer were significantly higher (p < .01) among the Ky5-exposed workers at all three sawmills (averages of 224, 99, and 148 pg/g fat) than among their respective nonexposed workers (averages of 43, 48, and 44 pg/g fat). These results indicate that workers had handled Ky5. When we expressed concentration levels in international toxic equivalents (I-TEQs), the mean total I-TEQ PCDD/PCDF of Ky5-exposed workers was significantly lower at one of the sawmills (average = 42 pg I-TEQ/g) than at the other two sawmills (averages of 64 and 62 pg I-TEQ/g)(p < .05). Nevertheless, total concentrations at the sawmills studied were within the range of background levels in the general population.

Glass fibre prefilter-XAD-2 sampling and gas chromatographic determination of airborne chlorophenols

Abstract A procedure for air sampling and analysis of polychlorinated phenols was developed and used for field measurements at two pulp-bleaching plants. The sampler consisted of an XAD-2 resin tube with a glass fibre prefliter. The filter and the resin were separately eluted with toluene, followed by acetylation of the chlorophenols with a mixture (5:2) of acetic acid anhydride and pyridine and determination by capillary gas chromatography using electron-capture and mass-selective detection. The sampler was tested in the μg/m 3 range for desorption and collection efficiency. The collection efficiency of the sampling device was not affected by humidity (40–80%) or sampling rate (200–750 ml/min) for the tested compounds. Stability tests at +20, +4 and −20°C showed no degradation of the chlorophenols studied during 4 weeks. The detection limit was below the μg/m 3 range for 180-1 air samples.

Identification by capillary gas chromatography—mass spectrometry of volatile organohalogen compounds formed during bleaching of kraft pulp

Abstract The occurrence of volatile halogenated compounds in spent liquors from kraft softwood and hardwood pulp bleaching processes was studied. The identity of the low-molecular-mass constituents was verified by capillary gas chromatography—mass spectrometry using an NBS/Wiley reference database and mass spectra of reference compounds. The purgeable fraction of the first chlorination stage of the softwood pulp contained numerically most of the organohalogen compounds detected. The ratio of chlorine to chlorine dioxide applied at this stage greatly affected the formation of the compounds. Identity was confirmed for fourteen components, of which two, dichloroacetonitrile and trichloromethanesulphonyl chloride, have not been previously identified in, e.g., bleach kraft effluents. The most abundant volatile compounds were chloroform, 1,1,1-trichloropropanone, trichloromethanesulphonyl chloride, 1,1,2,3,3-pentachloro-1-propene and pentachloropropanone. Several of these volatile compounds are known mutagens or suspected carcinogens.

Cytogenetic effects of softwood kraft pulp bleaching effluents and methanesulfonyl chloride in Chinese hamster ovary cells

The genotoxicity of effluents collected from a conventional 5-stage softwood kraft pulp bleaching process was studied in Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cells in vitro. Spent liquor from the first chlorination stage (C/D), where elemental chlorine and chlorine dioxide had been used in equal proportions, was shown to induce a dose-dependent increase in sister chromatid exchanges (SCEs) without metabolic activation (4-h treatment), with a maximum increase of 1.6 times over the control level at 204 microliters/ml; this dose also induced 15.5- and 20.5-fold increases in cells with chromatid-type chromosomal aberrations after 4-h and a 20-h treatment, respectively. Another C/D stage spent liquor from a process where the ratio of elemental chlorine and chlorine dioxide had been 9:1 produced a 40.5-fold elevation of cells with chromatid-type aberrations at 204 microliters/ml (20-h treatment). This sample clearly increased chromosomal aberrations also when tested as a concentrate (4-h treatment), which showed that the observed clastogenicity was not unspecifically due to the relatively large volumes used in the treatments with the unconcentrated liquors. In general, the use of rat liver S9 mix reduced the genotoxicity of the spent liquors. The results agree with earlier findings on the Salmonella mutagenicity of the same C/D samples: both the prokaryotic and eukaryotic assays showed a reduction in genotoxicity when the amount of elemental chlorine in the bleaching process was reduced. An effluent sample collected from the alkaline stage of the process was not clastogenic with or without metabolic activation. Methanesulfonyl chloride, a new compound identified in bleaching plant air, was found to be induce chromosomal aberrations in the presence of S9 mix.