OBJECTIVES Exposure assessment is a major challenge faced by studies that evaluate the association between pesticide exposure and adverse health outcomes. The objective of this study was to investigate the reliability of information that farmers self-report regarding their pesticide use. METHODS: Twenty five items based upon existing questionnaires were designed to focus on pesticide exposure. In 2009 a self-administrated survey was conducted on two occasions four weeks apart among 205 farmers residing in Gyeonggi and Gangwon provinces. For a reliability measure, we calculated the percentage agreement, the kappa statistics and the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) between the two reports according to the characteristics of the subjects. RESULTS: Agreement for ever-never use of any pesticide was 96.4% (kappa 0.61). For both 'years used' and 'age at the first use' of overall pesticides, high agreement was obtained (ICC: 0.88 and, 0.78, respectively), whereas those of 'days used' and 'hours used' were relatively low (ICC: 0.42 and, 0.66, respectively). The kappa value for the use of personal protective equipment ranged from 0.46 to 0.59, and hygiene activities came out at 0.19 to 0.37. The agreement for individual pesticide use ranged widely and there was relatively low agreement due to the low response rates. The reliability scores did not significantly vary according to gender, age, the education level, the types of crop or the years of farming. CONCLUSIONS: Our results support that carefully designed, self-reported information on ever-never pesticide use among farmers is reliable. However, the reliability of data on individual pesticide exposure may be unstable due to low response rates and needs to be refined.
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OBJECTIVES Particulate contaminants, such as total and respirable dusts, can harm the health of farm workers via several routes. The principal aims of this field study were to determine the concentrations and emissions of particulate contaminants: total and respirable dusts, in the different types of swine houses used in Korea, and allow objective comparison between Korea and the other countries in terms of swine housing types. METHODS: The swine houses investigated in this research were selected with respect to three criteria: the manure removal system, ventilation mode and growth stage of pigs. Measurements of total and respirable dust concentrations and emissions in the swine houses were carried out on 5 housing types at 15 different farm sites per housing type. The swine houses investigated were randomly selected from farms situated within the central districts in Korea: province of Kyung-gi, Chung-buk and Chung-nam. RESULTS: The total and respirable dust concentrations in the swine houses averaged 1.88 and 0.64 mg/m3, ranging from 0.53 to 4.37 mg/m3 and from 0.18 to 1.68 mg/m3, respectively. The highest concentrations of total and respirable dusts were found in the swine houses with deep-litter bed systems: 2.94 mg/m3 and 1.14 mg/m3, while the lowest concentrations were found in the naturally ventilated buildings with slats: 0.83 mg/m3 and 0.24 mg/m3, respectively (p< 0.05). All the swine houses investigated did not exceed the threshold limit values (TLVs) for total (10 mg/m3) and respirable (2.5 mg/m3) dusts. The mean emissions of total and respirable dusts, per pig (75 kg in terms of live weight) and area (m2), from the swine houses were 97.33 and 9.55 mg/h/pig and 37.14 and 12.83 mg/h/m2, respectively. The swine houses with deep-litter bed systems showed the highest emissions of total and respirable dusts (p< 0.05). However, the emissions of total and respirable dusts from the other swine houses were not significantly different (p> 0.05). CONCLUSION: The concentrations and emissions of total and respirable dusts were relatively higher in the swine houses managed with deep-litter bed systems and ventilated naturally of the different swine housing types tested. In further research, more farms than the number used in this research should be investigated, which will present objective and accurate data on the concentrations and emissions of total and respirable dusts in Korean swine houses. In addition, personal sampling should be performed to objectively assess the exposure level of farm workers to particulate contaminants.