A POTENTIAL HEALTH RISK OF OCCUPATIONAL EXPOSED WORKERS IN PETROCHEMICAL INDUSTRY OF BALLSH, ALBANIA

Petrochemical industries are known as sources of many toxic organic chemicals such as n-alkanes, brunched alkanes, cycloalkanes, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and dioxins. Safety and health risk of the petrochemical workers employed at Ballsh oil refinery, located in the Southwestern part of Albania is potentially high. Oil refinery workers are continuously exposed to numerous hazardous materials and working conditions. Nowadays, due to the health problems caused from long-term exposure, the research is putting more efforts in correlating the doses in human body with the levels in the environment. The aim of this study was to investigate the hepatic health effects on occupational long-term exposed workers of this petroleum refinery. Biochemical markers of liver and kidney function were analyzed in serum samples, using turbidimetric method. Liver biomarkers considered on this study were the aspartate aminotransferase - AST (SGOT), alanine aminotransferase - ALT (SGPT) and total bilirubin (TBIL). Furthermore, the kidney function of creatinine and urea were determined as well. Blood samples were collected from 1182 oil refinery workers. The target group control included 263 females from 26 - 63 years old and 919 males, from 19 - 69 years old. Gender differentiation data showed that, even if the mean values for the parameters were higher in males than females, the increases were not significant in most cases. The data were adjusted for age and gender. A statistical analysis of the obtained data has also been done.