Investigation of health risk assessment sevoflurane on indoor air quality in the operation room in Ahvaz city, Iran

Abstract

One of the important wards in educational hospital due to special conditions of patients is operating rooms (ORs). Anesthetic gases sevoflurane among air anesthetic pollutant is very dangerous for health care worker (HCW) and patients. The aim of this study was to associate the concentration of anesthetic toxic sevoflurane gases (ppm) indoor air in Emam, Razi and Golestan teaching hospitals OR during 2016. In the current study, portable pump SKC equipped with sorbent Tube Tenax TA 250 mg was used to sampling and measurements of sevoflurane gases concentration in the ORs. Three detection places were selected for sampling volatile anesthetic gases sevoflurane. In this study, health risks produced by non-cancer causing agents are quantified by calculating the hazard index (HI). Based on result this study, the Emam and Golestan had the lowest and the highest sevoflurane concentrations. According to the results from the current study, level of sevoflurane on indoor air quality in the operation room in Emam, Razi and Golestan hospitals were 2.058, 2.201 and 2.289 ppm, respectively. According result this study HI was under 1.0 and it amount showed that no significant risk of adverse health effects related to exposure to concentration of sevoflurane in Emam, Razi and Golestan teaching hospitals OR during 2016. Result showed that the average concentration of sevoflurane in studied hospitals were more than the standard level (2 ppm) and exposure to this concentration of sevoflurane could be threaten for HCW. Based on result our study, the average level of sevoflurane was significantly higher than that of ORs without standard ventilation in comparison with ORs with standard ventilation system. Performed active for decreasing anesthetic gases can cause decrease health endpoint in OR HCWs and costs. While OR management in ambient air can cause disorders in staffs and causing more spiritual and material costs.

Keywords:

• Risk assessment
• anesthetic
• sevoflurane
• hospital
• operating room
• Iran

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The authors gratefully acknowledge AJUMS and the Environmental Technologies Research Center (ETRC) for financial support and providing necessary facilities to accomplish the research with project number of ETRC-9303.