An electronics worker identified at health surveillance at work

A fifty year old lady was referred by her occupational physician because of declining lung function found on routine works surveillance. She worked as a solderer of printed circuit boards doing repair work by hand, latterly inspecting the results of others repair work. She had a history of asthma starting at the age of 20 or 21 when working for a different company as a hand solderer. The letter from her occupational lung physician gives the following lung function.

You take a history of disability and find if she has occasional wheezing evoked by: paint fumes; being upset; respiratory infections; cold air and fog. She isn't waking up short of breath at night, but has had 3 weeks off work in the last year with exacerbations of her asthma. Her inhaler technique is good and she is taking Becloforte 500 mcg twice daily, Salbutamol 200 mcg as required and she has had 4 courses of Prednisolone in the last year. She also takes Amlodipine 5 mg daily for hypertension.

Her occupational physician wants to know whether she is to continue her work with either direct or indirect exposure to soldering fumes. Click the links below to view further information and tests. You will sometimes be asked a question about the information which you may leave blank if you desire. Any answer you do give will be available to others. Upon answering the question you will see answers entered by others and the opinion of this website. None of these are necessarily correct. Once you have looked at all the information you want please fill in the question at the bottom of the page.

	Occupational History
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	Skin prick tests or IgE to common environmental allergens
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