Background: A variety of musculoskeletal disorders and discomfort are seen among brick kiln workers, where heavy physical work is associated with awkward working postures and manual handling of materials, leading to significant morbidity. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted in unorganized brick kiln industries in villages of Vellore district of Tamil Nadu and included 310 brick kiln workers. Modified Nordic Questionnaire was used to survey the prevalence of musculoskeletal disorders and the intensity of pain was assessed by the body pain discomfort scale. Results: The mean age of the workers was 37 ΁ 13.2 years with a range of 18-85 years. 62% (n = 192) had normal body mass index, whereas 27% (n = 85) were undernourished. The commonest posture adopted at work was squatting (67%) followed by standing (14%). Majority of workers (87%, n = 269) reported to having symptoms of pain currently of which 51% (n = 158) had pain during work. Chronic low back ache (LBA) (1 year prevalence -59%) and acute LBA (1 week prevalence-33%) were the commonest followed by chronic knee pain. More than 10 years of work was significantly associated (P < 0.05) with acute LBA and acute and chronic knee pain. Severity of the pain was also significantly (t statistic 2.476, P < 0.05) associated with job dissatisfaction. Conclusion: Long-term brick kiln workers, who adopt a specific posture for prolonged periods, have severe musculoskeletal pain that interferes with activities of daily living and reduces job satisfaction. Health education on frequent postural change, implementation and monitoring of laws among unorganized industries are recommended to bring down morbidity due to musculoskeletal disorders (MSD).

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Introduction: Ocular trauma is a worldwide cause of visual morbidity, a significant proportion of which occurs in the industrial workplace and includes a spectrum of simple ocular surface foreign bodies, abrasions to devastating perforating injuries causing blindness. Being preventable is of social and medical concern. Aim: A prospective case series study, to know the profile of ocular trauma at a hospital caters exclusively to factory employees and their families, to co-relate their demographic and clinical profile and to identify the risk factors. Materials and Methods: Patients with ocular trauma who presented at ESIC Model hospital, Rajajinagar, Bangalore, from June 2010 to May 2011 were taken a detailed demographic data, nature and cause of injury, time interval between the time of injury and presentation along with any treatment received. Ocular evaluation including visual acuity, anterior and posterior segment findings, intra-ocular pressure and gonio-scopy in closed globe injuries, X-rays for intraocular foreign body, B-scan and CT scan were done. Data analyzed as per the ocular trauma classification group. The rehabilitation undertaken medically or surgically was analyzed. At follow-up, the final best corrected visual acuity was noted. Results: A total of 306 cases of ocular trauma were reported; predominantly in 20-40 year age group (72.2%) and in men (75%). The work place related cases were 50.7%and of these, fall of foreign bodies led the list. Visual prognosis was poorer in road traffic accidents rather than work place injuries owing to higher occurrence of open globe injuries and optic neuropathy. Finally, 11% of injured cases ended up with poor vision. Conclusion: Targeting groups most at risk, providing effective eye protection, and developing workplace safety cultures may together reduce occupational eye injuries.

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Low back pain affects up to 90% of the world's population at some point in their lives. Until date no questionnaire has been designed for back pain in the garment industry workers. Therefore, the objective of this study is to design a questionnaire to determine the prevalence, risk factors, impact, health care service utilization and back pain features in the garment industry workers and gain preliminary experience of its use. The content validity and reliability of the questionnaire was established. Items showing acceptable internal consistency and moderate to high test re-test reliability were retained in the questionnaire. Items showing unacceptable internal consistency, low test re-test reliability or poor differentiation were reworded, redrafted and re-tested on the workers. It took 20 min to complete one interview schedule. Environmental factors such as the absence of the garment industry owner/supervisor or co-workers at the time of the interview and interview during leisure hours need to be standardized. Thus, final questionnaire is ready for use after necessary amendments and will be used on the larger sample size in the main study.

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Employees State Insurance Corporation (ESIC) hospital at Rajajinagar, Bengaluru conducts regular health camps at industries. The health camps promote and re-install the confidence among the workers and management of the industries in social security systems. Camps are considered as a stepping stone at reforming and improving the health of the workers for better productivity at industries.

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Silica exposure has been implicated with the development of various connective tissue diseases. We report a case of 32-year-old stone crusher who developed silicosis with mixed connective tissue disorder (MCTD) 6 years after exposure to silica. This association of silicosis with MCTD has never been reported from the Indian subcontinent, although the problem of this pneumoconiosis remains rampant. This rare association urges us to report this case.

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Context: Quantitative and Qualitative studies have been widely used in isolation to estimate several associations in developing countries, but little is known about combining both methods in a given study and ascertains validity. Aims: The objective of the following study was to accurately measure the constructs and to check for the internal consistency whereas measuring occupational stress among software professionals. We compared contextual stressors developed from the qualitative study with occupational stress index (OSI) among Information Technology/Information Technology Enabled Service (IT/ITES) professionals in India. Settings and Design: We employed mixed methods sampling strategy for selecting the IT/ITES professionals for the study. The first stage involved a qualitative study followed by a cross-sectional study among 1071 workers in the IT and ITES sector in Bengaluru. Materials and Methods: There were two types of stress domains used in the questionnaire. First, contextual stress domains, which were constructed based on the results of the qualitative study. Second, we used OSI for computer workers. Statistical Analysis Used: Data from the cross sectional survey was analyzed using SAS 9.1.(SAS Institute Inc., Cary, NC, USA). We used Cronbach's coefficient alpha for analyzing latent constructs of OSI and contextual stress domains. Results: The results indicate that OSI doesn't correlate well with contextual stressors. Conclusions: OSI is a generic questionnaire designed for a computer worker and using the contextual stressors based on the results from the qualitative study might capture the occupational stressors more reliably.

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Background: Sexually transmitted diseases are now gradually affecting the general population groups increasingly. Our earlier observations from qualitative research called for an effort to understand the sexual exposure, activity and behavior of the workers in these software professionals in Bengaluru, India. Aim: The current study is explored to understand the association of the sexual behaviors with Job. Materials and Methods: The study design employed was a cross-sectional study using a mixed sampling method. A total of 1071 subjects from software sector in Bengaluru, the capital city of Karnataka completed the self-administered questionnaire. The source population comprised all information technology/information technology enabled services (IT/ITES) professionals aged 20-59 years working in "technical functions" in 21 selected worksites (units) of the software industry. The exposure of interest was job stressors and the outcome measures were sexual behaviors in the form of having multiple sexual partners, paid sex in last 3 months and frequency of intercourse with irregular sexual partners and condom use with regular partners during last sexual act. Results: Among the study population, 74.3% reported not using a condom during their last vaginal intercourse with their regular partner. Regression estimates indicated that workers with high physical stressors had 6 times odds of having paid for sex in last 3 months and those with a moderate level of income related stress had 2.4 times likelihood of not using a condom during the last sexual intercourse with their regular partner. Conclusion: There is scope for starting prevention programs among young professionals in the IT/ITES sector to mitigate their possible risk behaviors.

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