Pre-heart failure in workers of key professions in the aluminum industry

Introduction. Harmful production factors in the aluminum industry make a significant contribution to the development of cardiovascular diseases, which are among the leading causes of mortality and disability among the population worldwide.The study aims to study the incidence and risk factors of pre-heart failure in workers of key professions in the aluminum industry.Materials and methods. The authors have examined 102 workers at the aluminum plant. The main group, men aged 40 to 55; 112 patients who had never worked in conditions involving exposure to fluorine were examined — the control group, men aged 40–55. All the subjects underwent echocardiography and a biochemical blood test.Results. We identified pre-heart failure in more than half of the aluminum production workers, which did not differ significantly from the control group. We did not find any reliable differences in modifiable risk factors between the study groups. In the main group, there was a reliable correlation between work experience under fluoride exposure and parameters characterizing pre-heart failure: with GLS (–0.2195; p=0.031); with the rate of early LV diastolic filling, characterizing LV diastolic function (–0.265; p=0.007); with e' of lateral LV wall (–0.263; p=0.008); with systolic pulmonary artery pressure (0.245; p=0.01).Limitations. The study is limited to the number of workers in key professions in the aluminum industry who underwent examination at the Clinic of the Federal State Budgetary Scientific Institution "Research Institute for Complex Problems of Hygiene and Occupational Diseases".Conclusion. The authors have identified a high incidence of pre-heart failure in long labour experience workers of the aluminum industry. In addition to arterial hypertension, the development of this condition in workers in the main professions of the aluminum industry is influenced by prolonged exposure to fluorine compounds.Ethics. The examination of patients complied with the ethical standards of the bioethics committee of the Federal State Budgetary Scientific Institution "Research Institute for Complex Problems of Hygiene and Occupational Diseases" (meeting protocol No. 4, § 2 dated November 18, 2021), developed in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration of the World Medical Association (2013 edition). All examined individuals gave written informed consent to participate in the study.Contributions:Korotenko O.Yu. — data collection and processing, statistical analysis, text writing, editing;Gumenyuk D.A. — data collection, text writing;Filimonov E.S. — data collection, editing.