Health Risk Assessment of Workers Engaged in Flour Mills

Flour mills are the epicentre of occupational health hazards resulting from the unorganised workplace and exhaustive activities carried out by the flour mill workers without any regard for safety. Taking into account the extent of difficulties faced by the workers of flour mills the present study was undertaken to know more about the different types of activities and various risks associated with the activities carried out in flour mills. The study was conducted through a properly framed research in Ludhiana city on 100 workers selected randomly from two zones of the city, who were vigorously involved in different tasks performed in the flour mills. An interview schedule was designed in order to obtain information from the selected respondents about their personal and professional backgrounds, as well as the challenges they faced while working in flour mills. Scales used for postural analysis of the respondents were Postural Discomfort Scale (Corlett and Bishop, 1976), Standardized Nordic Musculoskeletal Questionnaire (Kuorinka et al., 1987) and Rating of Perceived Exertion Scale (Varghese et al., 1994). Results revealed that factors contributing to worker health decline were working in filthy conditions without using any personal protective equipment leading to respiratory issues whereas injuries like dislocations, slips, cuts, falls were also reported due to carrying heavy load on slippery floor and due to unguarded machines. Postural analysis showed that lower back, upper back, neck and shoulders were the most affected body parts of the respondents.