PARENT SESSION

4E - Food Safety
Poster Hall
8:30 AM - Wednesday, 30 April 2003
Chair: Van Hemmen, J.¹, ¹
Co-chair: Trapp, S.², ²

(WEP/201) Risk assessment of dermal exposure to chemicals.

van Hemmen, Joop¹, ¹ TNO Chemistry, Zeist, Utrecht, Netherlands

ABSTRACT- Dermal exposure to industrial chemicals during work is of major concern in the risk assessment of chemicals. In the current procedures for European legislation, an approach is taken for which experimental data on dermal exposure in workplaces are lacking. A large project was granted by the European Commission (DG Research; RISKOFDERM, QLKA4-CT-1999-01107). The four-year project is now in its third year with the following major aims: - Develop a validated predictive model for estimating dermal exposure for use in generic risk assessment for single chemicals. - Develop a practical dermal exposure risk assessment and management toolkit for use by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and others, in actual workplace situations. To achieve the aims, a research programme comprising four interrelated work parts was formulated: 1) Qualitative survey in European workplaces to obtain an overview of tasks, processes and determinants relevant for dermal exposure. 2) Quantitative survey to obtain detailed data on dermal exposure and determinants in the most relevant tasks and processes. 3) Predictive dermal exposure model (set) using all relevant variables. 4) Risk assessment and management toolkit (on CD-ROM) from data on hazard, dermal absorption, dermal exposure and effectiveness of control measures for use in workplaces. At the time of the meeting full reports will be available on the detailed analyses of work parts 1 and 2. This information is input in the two other work parts. The toolkit is already available in a draft version for validation in practice and with quantitative exposure data from work part 2. Partners in the project are; TNO Chemistry (project co-ordination); Finnish Institute of Occupational Health; Health and Safety Executive / Laboratories; Institute of Occupational Medicine; National Institute of Working Life; Bundesanstalt fuer Arbeitsschutz und Arbeitsmedizin; Institute of Risk Assessment Sciences, Utrecht University; Institut National de Recherche et de Securite; Instituto Nacional de Saude Dr. Ricardo Jorge; Occupational Medicine, Turin University; Miljoe-Chemie; FoBiG; Allgemeine Unfallsversicherungsanstalt; Bau-Berufsgenossenschaft; Instituto Nacional de Seguridad e Hygiene en el Trabajo.

Key words: worker exposure, dermal exposure , worker exposure modelling, risk assessment