Exposure Assessment for Formaldehyde and Acetaldehyde in the Workplace

Abstract

Personal exposure and possible cancer risk to formaldehyde and acetaldehyde were appraised in 8 work places at a university in Brazil. Levels of formaldehyde measured ranged from 22.5 to 161.5 μg·m−3 and from 18.3 to 91.2 μg·m−3 for acetalde-hyde. The personal exposure, expressed as the potential dose in indoor air, was calculated to range from 129.8 to 930.4 μg·day−1 (low exposure) and 183.9 to 1318.1 μg·day−1 (medium exposure) for formaldehyde and 105.5 to 525.3 μg·day−1 (low exposure) and 149.5 to 744.2 μg·day−1 (medium exposure) for acetaldehyde. The indoor/outdoor ratio showed the existence of indoor sources of the compounds which were mainly in practical classes and research laboratories. The highest formaldehyde and acetaldehyde levels were found where chemical reagents were manipulated. Relating the levels found to the permissible limit given by the US OSHA showed there was no particular risk although some formaldehyde levels did exceed the lower exposure limit of the US agency NIOSH. Any cancer risk would be highest for female technicians and teaching researchers.

Risk Assessment of Indoor Formaldehyde and Other Carbonyls in Campus Environments in Northwestern China

“…Indoor carbonyl concentrations have been measured worldwide in various microenvironments, such as hospitals (Yu and Crump, 2006), temples (Ho and Yu, 2002), academic institutes (Cavalcante et al, 2005;Crump et al, 2005;Yamashita et al, 2011), subway stations and tunnels , residential buildings (Crump et al, 1997;Huang et al, 2011), shopping centers (Tang et al, 2009), hotels (Feng et al, 2004;Chan et al, 2011), cinemas (Weng et al, 2009), offices (Yu and Crump, 2000;Ongwandee et al, 2009), museums (Báez et al, 2003) and photocopy centers . However, such an evaluation is still not comprehensive on the Mainland of China (Wang et al, 2007), which has an urgent need for specialized research because of the large changeability in meteorological conditions and human behavior observed in China.…”

Exposure and cancer risk assessment for formaldehyde and acetaldehyde in the hospitals, Fortaleza-Brazil

“…A liquideliquid extraction was then performed with 4 mL of HPLC-grade dichloromethane (Merck) to purify the solution [20].…”

A comparison of two simplified methods of exposure risk assesment of inhalation of chemical agents: the COSHH essentials method and the INRS-based method

“…Estas características sugieren que los métodos simplificados son preferibles a los más complejos métodos cuantitativos, como primera opción, para la evaluación del riesgo químico. Hasta donde sabemos existen una diversidad de estudios de evaluación cuantitativa del riesgo por inhalación en laboratorios y centros universitarios [4][5][6][7] , pero los que lo hagan utilizando métodos de evaluación simplificada son más reducidos 8 .…”