Mohammad Pourmahabadian

Noise pollution is a major problem for the quality of life in urban areas. The present study was conducted to determine the noise levels of road traffic at central area of Tehran. It focused on one of the busy and crowded square along with its 7 connecting streets, which had a heavy traffic and located in the downtown of the city. Total of 115 measuring points were selected along the roads, pavements and in the shopping areas to adequately represent the different acoustically commercial situations. The measuring points were divided in to 4 site-groups namely; Street, Pavement, Shop and Barrier each with 60, 40, 10, and 5 measuring points respectively. The measurements were carried out during a full week days started on Saturday morning and end on Friday evening. The A-weighted continuous equivalent sound level values, LAeq; LA max; LA min ; and the statistical levels: L1, L10, L50, L90 and L99 as well as the octave band center frequencies sound pressure levels were manually measured at each point separately. The mean values of LAeq for Street, Pavement, Shop and Barrier site groups were 78.5, 73.3, 68.7 and 70.8 dBA respectively and the overall mean of LAeq was 74.7 dBA. The statistical test (p<0.01) showed that the mean values for LAeq in all site groups as well as the overall mean value were higher than 65 dBA, which is the daytime governmentally prescribed noise limit for commercial areas. Comparing the individual measurements has also shown the 86.6% exceeded values from 65 dBA. The highest mean noise level in center frequencies upper than 1000 Hz was 71.5 dBA which was observed in the Street site group and the lowest one was 43.2 dBA in the Shop site group at 8000Hz center frequency. The corresponding values for the center frequencies lower than 1000 Hz were 78.2 and 66.1dBA at 63 and 500 Hz which were also observed in the Street and Shop site groups respectively. It can be concluded that the downtown of the city is environmentally noise polluted and the road traffic is the major source of it. Noting the noise emission standards, police control, and promoting the citizens awareness about the high level noise risk may help to relieve the noise problems in the city.

Objective: Exposure assessment of individual press workers to risk factors associated with work-related upper extremity muscoluskeletal disorders (UEMSDs). Design: This was a workplace field based, descriptive and analytical study. Place and duration: The study was conducted in presswork shops of an automobile manufacturing industry in Tehran, Iran during 2004-2005. Patients and Methods: Nordic Musculoskeletal Questionnaire (NMQ) and Rapid Upper Limb Assessment (RULA) ergonomics posture based method were applied among 50 workers who work in bending, impact and hydraulic press shops. Then RULA and NMQ results were analysed and compared against each other through SPSS statistical package. Results: The results of this study showed that among all 50 press workers high and low prevalence of pain existed in low back (60%), shoulder and back (16%-18%), respectively. Whilst in other part of body such as thighs and legs, wrist and neck it varies from 22%-44%. In addition, RULA and NMQ result...

Musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) are important causes of work incapacity and loss of work days. MSDs are major problems in almost all countries and increasingly can be found in service industries such as maritime sector. This study aimed at evaluation of MSDs symptoms among crew of tugboats, dredgers, pilot boats and barges by using Nordic Musculoskeletal Questionnaire (NMQ) and also determination of work-related MSDs risk factors by application of Ovako Working Analysis Posture System (OWAS). The result showed that 28.4% of body postures rated in action category 3 and 4 of OWAS. It seems that OWAS cannot be used as a determination method of risk factors for all jobs. Also, the best and sometimes the only way to correct awkward postures is correction of worker's back position. Acta Medica Iranica, 42(5): 350-354; 2004