Biomarker of occupational airways inflammation for exposure to inorganic dust

Occupational airways inflammation occurs when the bronchial tubes airways have become swollen and oversensitive due to unwanted particles gases and particulate matter of inorganic dust such as asbestos, silica and coal dust. Workers’ biomarker of airways inflammation is used as tools to interpret their lung metabolism and toxic mechanism reaction with pollutant exposed by industrial process. The aim of this review is to determine compatible biomarker that is used in diagnosis occupational airways inflammation from the exposure of inorganic dust. This review summarize the outcome of workers’ biomarkers that indicate airways inflammation caused by occupational exposure to the industrial pollutant. Relevance online database and data from previous epidemiological studies have been used in this study. Previous study found that Tumor Necrosis Factor-Alpha (TNF-α), Interleukin-6 (IL-6) and Interleukin-8 (IL-8) in spontaneous sputum, induced sputum, nasal wash and bronchoalveolar Lavage (BAL) have significantly correlate with symptoms of occupational asthma among the workers. Few studies have examined on non-invasive methods of EBC and FENO as biomarkers because of their reliability and sensitivity screening tools to diagnosed occupational asthma by determined eosinophil level in airway inflammation with a significant correlation of asthma severity. Several studies of occupational asthma had also suggested the combination use of different biomarker or pulmonary analysis such as lung function test for better results. Workers’ biomarkers indicate occupational disease regarding their airways inflammation and guiding the clinician on decisions for further treatment. IL-6 and IL-8 mostly used as the biomarker of occupational asthma to indicate the exposure of industrial pollutant.