The exposure of temple workers to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons

Five temples, each a different size, were selected for this study. Two of the temples were located in Taichung City (in central Taiwan), and three were in Tainan City (in Southern Taiwan). Aerosols smaller than 10 μm aerodynamic diameter (PM10) were collected by using personal collection samplers during pilgrim days (the first and fifteenth day of each lunar month) and normal days (all other days). Regression analysis showed that about 1.6 μg/m3 of PM10 contributed to the workers' exposure in the temples for each joss stick increase in the censer. The concentrations of total polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (t-PAHs) and carcinogenic PAHs (car-PAHs) on pilgrim days were higher than those on normal days. Mean concentrations of urinary 1-hydroxypyrene (1-OHP) in the pre-shift and post-shift workers of the five temples on normal days were 1.20 and 1.61 μg/g creatinine, respectively. Furthermore, the post-shift concentrations of 1-OHP in the workers of temples on pilgrim days were all higher than those of the workers of corresponding temples on normal days. Significant relationships between the urinary concentrations of 1-OHP and the exposure concentrations of pyrene, total PAHs and BaPeq were found in the workers of the temples. Results of linear regression showed that the increase of unit concentration (1 ng/m3) of pyrene led to a 0.05 μg/g creatinine increase of urinary 1-OHP, while the increase of unit concentration (1 ng/m3) of BaPeq resulted in an increase of 0.03 μg/g creatinine of urinary 1-OHP.