Occupational particle exposure assessment in a pharmaceutical facility using video exposure monitoring system

The purpose of this study was to perform video exposure monitoring of personal particle exposures at a pharmaceutical research and development facility and to investigate the exposure variations between operations and within operations as well as the factors associated with the variations. In addition, the study was conducted to explore the possibility and applicability of using the video exposure monitoring (VEM) system to enhance industrial hygiene practices in the pharmaceutical industry. Twenty-four sets of VEM data were analyzed for unit dose operations for tablet manufacturing, with the particle exposure measurements determined by the light scattering particle sensor. The between-run exposure variations were found to be associated with the combination of seven exposure variables (ventilation type, amount of materials, material forms, use of mechanical forces, open status of the machine, workers\u27 experiences and their attention to exposures) by using the scoring criteria established by the investigator. Exposure variations within each operation run were observed in the real-time video exposure profiles, and the pattern of exposure changes along the course of the operation run was associated with the workplace events (the machine\u27s running and the worker\u27s materials-handling activities). For the operations in which the machine was open to the air, the exposures when the machine was running were considerable and associated with the medium-high level of real-time particle measurements. In both the low- or high-exposure operations, materials-handling activities, especially charging the machine with the powdered materials, were the main sources of extreme real-time particle measurements in most of the runs. It was also found that the peak exposures over the 75th and 90th percentile values accounted for considerable proportions of the overall exposures, with an average of 63% and 47% respectively, and most of them could be attributed to machine\u27s running and materials-handling activities. This was the first study using the wireless VEM system to evaluate the particle exposures of pharmaceutical workers. The wireless VEM system developed at Purdue Exposure Assessment Research Laboratory showed the capability of sampling and assessing the particle exposures in pharmaceutical operations. Using the VEM data, the study could explain the causes for most of the changes in exposures, which helped the investigator suggest solutions for exposure control