HHS HealthBeat (June 27, 2006)

Field work

From the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, I'm Ira Dreyfuss with HHS HealthBeat.

Farm field work isn't exactly operating room hygiene. And a look at conditions in North Carolina indicates it's not even close. Researchers at Wake Forest University School of Medicine examined Hispanic farm workers.

Wake Forest's Thomas Arcury tells what they found:

"About 80 percent of the farmworkers in the study had a skin problem. The most common types were fungal infections similar to athlete's foot, as well as infections of the nails." (10 seconds)

Arcury believes those conditions are common among workers on farms elsewhere in America, too. He says good hygiene can prevent trouble, but this requires sanitary facilities on the farm as well as self-care by farmworkers.

The work, reported in the Journal of Agricultural Safety and the American Journal of Industrial Medicine, was supported by the National Institutes of Health.

Learn more at www.hhs.gov.

HHS HealthBeat is a production of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. I'm Ira Dreyfuss.

Last revised: August, 15 2006