Aim: It is known that in cleaning staff, respiratory symptoms appear after exposure to cleaning products and the airways are affected. Impulse oscillometry (IOS) can detect small airway disease even when spirometry values are normal. In this study, it was aimed to detect pathologies in small airways in the early period with impulse oscilometry (IOS) in cleaning stuff.
Method: It is a cross-sectional real-life study involving 121 hospital cleaning staff and a control group of 106 office workers without chemical exposure. Demographic data, spirometry and IOS measures of the participants was recorded and the results were statistically analysed.
Results: There were no difference between groups regarding their age, gender, smoking history (p>0.05) It was found that the R5%, R20%, R5-20%, X20%, AX, Fres values of cleaning staff were higher compared with the control group (p<0.001, p<0.05, p<0.01, p<0.001, p<0.05, p<0.01 ). There was no difference between FEV1 values (p>0.05). (Table)
Conclusion: Small airway disease as a result of chemical inhalation is common in cleaning workers and IOS can be used to detect airway diseases in the early period.
| Cleaning Staff | Control Group | p | |
| FEV1% | 104.25±15.3 | 103.23±14.18 | <0.574 |
| R5% | 144 (122-189) | 127 (100-150) | <0.001 |
| R20% | 139 (123.5-162.5) | 135 (111.5-148.25) | <0.022 |
| R5-R20% | 22.3 (15.05-31.72) | 17.1 (9.39-27.69) | <0.007 |
| X20% | 29 (-23-72) | 69.5 (35-116) | <0.001 |
| Fres | 16.41 (13.34-21.16) | 14.43 (10.95-18.7) | <0.003 |
| AX | 0.44 (0.22-0.95) | 0.33 (0.17-0.61) | <0.018 |