**4. Chemical risk factors**

increasing working hours per week results in an increase in the possibility of being injured. Professionals, who did not receive the occupational health and safety (OHS) training before, have more accidents [4]. Nonfatal accidents at work and occupational disease cases of health professionals take place at the top compared to other industries [5]. But in Turkey, the inclu‐ sion of hospitals in "Very Dangerous Jobs" class was approved barely in 2009 via "Hazard Classes List Notification Relating Work Health and Safety" [6, 7]. This list was formed accord‐

The health‐related risks associated with health professionals can be grouped as psychoso‐ cial, physical, biological, chemical and ergonomic factors. American National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) has reported 29 kinds of physical, 25 kinds of chemical, biological 24 varieties, 10 and six kinds of ergonomic and psycho‐social hazards

The main physical risk factors which affect health professionals are ionizing and nonionizing radiation, noise, lighting, electrical assembly, slippery floors, hot/cold, ventilation, vibration and indoor pollution. Ionizing radiation is one of the most important physical hazards in hospitals, and it influences various different health professionals in different units and with different professions (mainly radiotherapy, nuclear medicine and radiology staff). It has car‐ cinogenic, teratogenic and mutagenic impacts, and it is fatal in high concentrations. It leads to burns, cataracts, infertility, genetic and congenital anomalies in moderate concentrations, and it causes cancer (particularly leukemia) during long‐term exposure [8, 12, 13]. Nonionizing radiation is another physical risk factor for health professionals. It has been stated that the increment in the use of devices with electromagnetic fields and exposure to these electromag‐ netic fields deteriorate the body balance and lead to diseases. It has been reported that the exposure to nonionizing radiation particularly during the work time about 8–10 h leads to feeling of dryness in the throat, eye problems, headaches, allergies, facial flushing, insomnia,

Loudness is another important factor, which disturbing people, complicates the commu‐ nication, restricts the relaxation, adversely affects and harms the nervous system, reduces the work efficiency and creates hearing problems. Studies have shown that loudness has increased at a level of discomfort in patients and health professionals in hospitals in the last

The ventilation system of the hospitals has importance in the health protection of both patients and health professionals in terms of nosocomial infections. Therefore, the ventilation systems should be established to prevent the nosocomial infections by paying attention to biological

ing to NACE code.

46 Occupational Health

and risks [8–11].

50 years [12, 16, 17].

**3. Physical risk factors**

**2. Occupational risks of health professionals**

sensitivity to sounds, hearing difficulties and fatigue [8, 14, 15].

and physical features of related microorganisms [2].

Various chemicals are key agents which are used in order to diagnose and treat the diseases, perform the preventive applications and take hygienic precautions, whereas they are hazardous for health status of health professionals. Health professionals are exposed to chemicals (disinfec‐ tants to anesthetic agents, cytotoxic agents, drugs and some heavy metals such as mercury and latex) repeatedly and sometimes in very dense amounts. Similarly, their impacts show a wide variety according to the concentrations, contact time and way, the presence of other risky agents and personal features, etc. [19]. Acids and alkalis, salts, dyes, volatile organic solvents, various drugs including primarily anticancer drugs in pathology, biochemistry, hematology and other laboratories are important risk factors for a series of diseases from allergy to cancer [8, 20].

Drugs that cause severe organ toxicity and other toxic effects and drugs that show mutagenic, carcinogenic, teratogenic effects or any of the reproductive system disorders are defined as "hazardous drugs." The long‐term exposure to these antineoplastic/cytotoxic drugs used in chemotherapy leads to potential risks in health professionals. At the stage of preparation, administration and waste disposal of these drugs, severe health outcomes can be observed due to the inhalation of powder and droplets, the absorption through the skin, the ingestion of contaminated food as well as particularly teratogenic, carcinogenic and genotoxic effects that threaten the reproduction during pregnancy [10, 12, 13, 19–23].
