There’s a lot of it about. Health and Safety Executive (HSE) statistics reveal that it is most commonly caused by contact with soaps and cleaning products and working with wet hands. The highest incidence of dermatitis is found amongst florists, beauticians and hairdressers. These are increasingly female dominated occupations and this might go some way to explaining why the recorded cases of dermatitis split 68% female to 35% male over the last couple of year – though the split has been more equal historically. Another more or less equal split is between the types of contact dermatitis reported in data from 2002-05, with allergic dermatitis making up 43% of recorded cases and irritant dermatitis 40%.
From reporting by General Practitioners it is estimated that 40,000 new cases of skin disease (predominantly types of dermatitis) a year are directly attributable to employment. The HSE data for the period 2009-11 estimated that 132 out of every 100,000 workers is currently suffering from occupational contact (irritant) dermatitis and that the condition represents 2% of all occupational illnesses for which certified sickness absence was taken. Compare that against the 210 out of 100,000 workers who suffer the most common accident of all at work – a slip or a trip, to gauge the unacceptable prevalence of this very unpleasant and debilitating skin disease.
The Self-reported Work related Illness survey (SWI survey) which is part of the Labour Force Survey, uncovered further astonishing facts about the widespread occurrence of dermatitis in the UK workforce. From responses received it was estimated that between 9000 and 22,000 people had a skin problem which they suspected was caused or worsened by their work.
What the currently available statistics and survey evidence suggest is that although the number of cases of occupational contact or industrial dermatitis formally diagnosed by GPs has declined markedly, by as much as two thirds in the last six years, survey evidence paints a depressing picture of a skin disease still very prevalent in the workforce, self-diagnosed, not generally presented to doctors or hospitals and not being sufficiently addressed at source by competent and effective workplace health and safety systems.
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