A Field Study on the Physiological Workload of Garbage Collectors in the Japanese Summer

Abstract

A field study designed to reveal the physiological workload on garbage collectors (GC) was conducted in Japan. Three drivers who only operated a garbage truck, three loaders who actually collected as a team, three solo collectors, and one clerical worker, totaling 10 male workers participated in this study. The ambient temperature and the relative humidity, activity intensity, and heart rate were measured on the three days in July. The mean heart rate of the workers, excluding the clerical worker, was 97.5 bpm. There were cases in which the heart rate limit, as defined by ACGIH, was exceeded, including a case in which the loader sustainably exceeded this limit for over an hour. There were 10 worker-days in which the 58%HRmax level (corresponding to the permissible limit specified in the Netherlands) was exceeded based on the findings of the 18 worker-days for the loaders and solo collectors. There were many cases in which the energetic load of GC in the humid summertime in Japan exceeded the permissible limits as established in the U.S.A. and the Netherlands. The careful inspection of the actual work conditions and improvements in the work environment should be implemented for the occupational safety and health of GC.

Measured by the oxygen uptake in the field, the work of refuse collectors is particularly hard work: Are the limit values for physical endurance workload too low?

“…In addition, they identified HR values during the actual working time which can be compared with our values for 1 h of continuous work. A recent Japanese study by Tsujimura et al ( 2012 ) found mean HR values for garbage collectors of 97.5 b/min, which were similar to the Brazilians but lower than our findings. These studies of refuse collectors, however, determined the workload only by the HR without VO 2 field measurements.…”

“…Only few studies have investigated in detail the refuse collectors in different countries with different tasks. Up to now, the heart rate (HR) is used as an indirect indicator of the physiological workload, for example in the Netherlands (Kemper et al 1990 ), Japan (Tsujimura et al 2012 ), and Brazil (Anjos et al 2007 ). The oxygen uptake (VO 2 ), as a direct measure of the metabolic processes, however, was mostly estimated via HR in these groups.…”