MT6314 ENVIRONMENTAL AND OCCUPATIONAL TOXICOLOGY Flashcards
Deals with the effects of chemicals in the workplace
Occupation toxicology
Major emphasis of occupational toxicology is to identify?
agents of concern
acute and chronic diseases
conditions for safe use
preventive measures
Can be called upon to treat the disease caused by chemicals
Occupational toxicologist
Occupational toxicologists may also?
carry out programs for surveillance
Regulatory limits for “safe” chemical exposure is promulgated by?
Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA)
What are “safe” chemical exposure limits denoted as?
Permissible Exposure Limits (PELs)
Periodically prepare lists of their consensus versions of “safe” threshold limit values
American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists
Environmental toxicology is now called?
Ecotoxicology
What does ecotoxicology deal with?
impact of chemicals (as pollutants in the environment)
toxic effects of chemical and physical agent on populations and communities of living organisms within defined ecosystems.
Ecotoxicology includes the study of?
transfer pathways of those agents & interactions with the environment
Concerned with the toxic effects on individual organisms
Traditional Toxicology
Air pollution is a main product of?
Industrialization, Technologic Development and
Urbanization
Environment mainly composes of?
Air, soil, water
Denote the daily intake of a chemical from food
Acceptable daily intake (ADI)
What air pollutant has the smallest permissible exposure limit value? and the biggest?
Smallest - ozone
Largest - 1,1,1-
trichloroethane
ability of chemical agent to cause injury/disease in a given situation or setting
Hazard
To assess hazards, one needs to have?
knowledge on the inherent toxicity of a substance
amounts to which individuals are liable to be exposed
Hazards are often based on?
Estimates rather than objective evaluation
expected frequency of the of the occurrence of an undesirable effect arising from exposure to a chemical or physical agent
Risk
Estimation of risk makes use of what data?
Dose-response data
Extrapolation from the observed relationships to the expected responses at doses occurring at exposure
Differs in different exposure situations
Route of entry
Major route of entry
Inhalation
Relatively minor route to transdermal
Oral ingestion
Primary prevention should be designated to reduce or eliminate?
Absorption by inhalation by topical contact
Routes of entry of atmospheric pollutants
inhalation and dermal
Water and soil pollutants route of entry
Inhalation, ingestion, and dermal
How much exposure notes chronic exposure?
Multiple exposures over a longer period of time
What exposures are usually chronic?
Air and water pollutants
Ranking of industrial routes of exposure?
Inhalation > Transdermal Route > Oral
An exposure to a toxic substance that is absorbed by the target human or animal results in?
a dose
single exposure or multiple exposure over a brief period of time
Acute exposure
single or multiple exposure over a longer period of time
Chronic Exposure
Hierarchy of controls?
Elimination > Substitution > Engineering controls > Administrative controls > PPE
Least and most effective control?
Least - PPE
Most - Elimination
Isolate people from the hazard
Engineering controls
Change the way people work
Administrative controls
Replace the hazard
Substitution
Physically remove the hazard
Elimination
Poorly degraded chemicals exhibit?
Persistence and can accumulate
Poorly degraded chemicals include?
Persistent organic pollutants (POPs), polychlorinated biphenyls, dioxins and furans
Responsible for the bioaccumulation of mercury compounds in higher marine mammals and fish higher in the food chain
Methyl mercury discharges
Tend to accumulate in body fat and cause endocrine disruption, neurological disorders, and carcinogenesis
Lipophilic substances: organochlorine pesticides
Intake of a contaminant by an organism exceeds the latter’s ability to metabolize or excrete the substance
Bioaccumulation
Contaminant concentration may be virtually undetectable in water, and may be magnified hundreds or thousands or times as the contaminant passes up the food chain
Biomagnification
Results from vapors, aerosols, smokes, particulates and individual chemicals
Air pollution
Associated with acute adverse effects among children, elderly and individuals with pre existing cardiac or respiratory disease
Sulfur dioxide and smoke from incomplete combustion of coal
Colorless, tasteless, odorless and non-
irritating gas
Carbon Monoxide (CO)
Carbon Monoxide (CO) is a byproduct of?
incomplete combustion
Mechanism of action in carbon monoxide?
Combines tightly but reversibly with o2 binding sites in hemoglobin 220x more than oxygen
Affinity of CO with Hb product is?
Carboxyhemoglobin (cannot transport oxygen)
The formation of COHb is a result of what effect?
Bohr effect
What organs are most affected with COHb?
Brain, heart, kidneys
Has teratogenic potential, easily absorbed through the lungs
CO
CO exposure may be?
Chronic or acute
CO is usually seen in?
gas stoves; generators gasoline-powered equipment; automobile exhaust and tobacco smoke
Clinical effects of CO?
Hypoxia developing from psychomotor impairment, headache and tightness in the temporal area, confusion and loss of visual acuity, tachycardia, tachypnea, syncope, and coma and deep coma, convulsions, shock and respiratory failure
40% COHb exposure may lead to?
collapse and syncope
Clinical effects are aggravated by?
- Heavy labor
- High Altitude
- High Ambient Temperature
- Cardiorespiratory disease
- Smoking exposure
CO intoxication is usually thought of as a form of what kind of toxicity?
Acute
T or F: The developing fetus is quite susceptible to the effects of CO exposure
T
Treatment for CO?
Remove from source
Maintain respiration (O2 is specific antagonist for CO)
What kind of therapy can be done as treatment for CO?
Hypothermic therapy
What persists for a long time after treatment of CO?
Neuropsychological and motor dysfunction
Colorless irritant gas generated primarily by the combustion of sulfur-containing fossil fuel
Sulfur Dioxide (SO2)
Principal source of urban SO2 is?
burning of coal, domestic heating, high-sulfur transportation and coal-fired power plants
At room temperature, the solubility of SO2 is approximately?
200g SO2/L of water
SO2 is a severe irritant to?
eyes, mucous membranes, respiratory tract and skin
T or F: Because of SO2’s high solubility, when it comes in contact with moist membranes, it becomes sulfurous acid
T
Inhalation of SO2 causes?
bronchioconstriction and bronchorrhea
Clinical outcome of 90% of inhalation of SO2 in the upper Respiratory tract?
Acute Irritant Asthma
When severe acute SO2 exposure has occurred, what may be observed?
Delayed onset pulmonary edema
Treatment for SO2 is?
supportive, non-specific
Brownish irritant gas associated with fires and formed from fresh silage
Nitrogen Oxides (NO2)
Exposure of farmers to Nitrogen Oxides (NO2) in the silo can lead to what illness?
Silo-filler’s disease, a severe and potentially lethal form of acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS)
The most common source of human exposure to NO2 comes from?
automobile and truck traffic emissions
Relatively insoluble deep lung irritant
Nitrogen Oxides (NO2)
Nitrogen Oxides (NO2) is capable of producing what illnesses from its mechanism of action?
pulmonary edema and ARDS
Inhalation of Nitrogen Oxides (NO2) damages what?
lung infrastructure that produces the surfactant necessary to allow smooth and low-effort lung alveolar expansion
After respiratory insult from NO2, what can patient develop?
non-irritant asthma or twitchy airway
What events cause permanent restrictive respiratory disease?
Damage to the type 1 and 2 alveolar cells, that impairs the type 1’s ability to replenish, causing progressive fibrosis
Acute or Chronic exposure to NO2: Irritation of eyes and nose, cough, mucoid or frothy sputum production
Acute
Acute or Chronic exposure to NO2: dyspnea and chest pain; Pulmonary edema, fibrotic destruction of terminal bronchioles
Acute
Acute or Chronic exposure to NO2: Emphysematous changes
Chronic
Bluish irritant gas naturally found in the earth’s atmosphere
Ozone (O3) and Other Oxides