Jpn. J. Health Phys., 46 (2) 140 147 (2011) * 1 * 2 * 2 * 2 2010 10 22 2011 2 21 Development and Operational Results of a Real-time Remote Biological Information Monitoring Device for the Workers Wearing Protective Clothes at a Nuclear Facility Naoki TAKAHASHI,* 1 Joo-Young LEE,* 2 Hitoshi WAKABAYASHI* 2 and Yutaka TOCHIHARA* 2 Workers must wear a respirator and protective clothing to prevent inhalation and contamination by radioactive materials when carrying out certain inspection, maintenance activities at nuclear facilities and other emergency situations. Temperature and humidity increase with time within the protective clothing during such work. This is because the protective clothing is necessarily impermeable so that heat and perspiration caused by physical labor remain. Therefore, the worker s body temperature and related heatstroke risk gradually increase. To date, workers wearing the protective clothing have been supervised by time management and individual subjective information. This conventional management method may physiological information (including measured worker s infrared tympanic temperature and heart rate) with individual subjective information, in order to reduce the risk of heatstroke. To this end, a remote (heat strain) monitoring device has operational results obtained under actual working conditions. KEY WORDS: remote monitoring, heat strain, heat stroke, protective clothing, infrared tympanic temperature, rectal temperature, nuclear facility. I. * 1 4 33 319 1194 Conversion Technology Section, Tokai Reprocessing Technology Development Center, Nuclear Fuel Cycle Engineering Laboratories, Japan Atomic Energy Agency; 4 33 Muramatsu Tokai-mura, Nakagun, Ibaraki 319 1194, Japan. E-mail: takahashi.naoki11@jaea.go.jp * 2 4 9 1 815 8540 Faculty of Design, Kyushu University; 4 9 1 Shiobaru, Minami-ku, Fukuoka 815 8540, Japan. Fig. 1 1, 2) 80 3)
Development and Operational Results of a Real-time Remote Biological Information Monitoring Device for the Workers Wearing Protective Clothes at a Nuclear Facility 141 Fig. 1 Typical protective clothing for nuclear facilities. 4) 5, 6) 7) 8) 5) 9) 20 10) 4 2 10 11) II 1. ACGIH American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists 12)
142 Naoki TAKAHASHI, Joo-Young LEE, Hitoshi WAKABAYASHI and Yutaka TOCHIHARA 38.5 38 1 110 Fig. 2 13, 14) RFID Radio Frequency Identi cation Fig. 2 Ear plug type temperature measurement sensor (above) and wearing conditions (below). Fig. 3 The developed device (above) and wearing conditions (below).
Development and Operational Results of a Real-time Remote Biological Information Monitoring Device for the Workers Wearing Protective Clothes at a Nuclear Facility 143 Fig. 3 85 55 25 mm RFID 128 54 20 mm 2 12 3 ID SD 8 1 1 2 PC 37.5 38 2 38 1 15) 3 3 Fig. 4 Fig. 5 III 1
144 Naoki TAKAHASHI, Joo-Young LEE, Hitoshi WAKABAYASHI and Yutaka TOCHIHARA Fig. 4 The image of working management using the management device. Fig. 5 Visible of the measurement data. 13 cm 2 2 3.5 kg 28 50 10 80W 50 20 2. 1. 36 176 cm 69 kg
Development and Operational Results of a Real-time Remote Biological Information Monitoring Device for the Workers Wearing Protective Clothes at a Nuclear Facility 145 26.6 77.1 1 Fig. 6 Fig. 6 from casing). IV 1. Fig. 7 Fig. 7 Fig. 7 10 Fig. 7 Change of rectal temperature and infrared tympanic temperature. 16) ACGIH 2. Fig. 8 18 7
146 Naoki TAKAHASHI, Joo-Young LEE, Hitoshi WAKABAYASHI and Yutaka TOCHIHARA V Fig. 8 Actual measurement results in the workplace. (above: infrared tympanic temperature and heart rate change, below: temperature and humidity change inside the protective clothing). 37.7 150 0.066 150 120 0.03 38.8 170 5 10 31 32 90 ACGIH 38.8 170 1) 25, 82 84 (1990). 2) II 26, 123 126 (1991). 3) C. L. LIM, C. BYRNE and J. KW. LEE; Human thermoregulation and measurement of boby temperature in exercise and clinical settings, Ann. Acad. Med., 37, (4), 347 353 (2008).
Development and Operational Results of a Real-time Remote Biological Information Monitoring Device for the Workers Wearing Protective Clothes at a Nuclear Facility 147 4) M. A. KOLAKA, L. LEVINE and L. A. STEPHENSON; Use of an ingestible telemetry sensor to measure core temperature under chemical protective clothing, J. Therm. Biol., 22 (4/5) 343 349 (1997). 5) 41 (10), 801 804 (2000). 6) 52 (12), 2 10 (2006). 7) The Annals of physiological anthropology, 12 (1), 31 38 (1993). 8) 41 (1), 55 59 2004 9) 21 Available at: http:// www.mhlw.go.jp/stf/houdou/2r98520000006xcz.html, 2011 2 7 10) Available at: http://www.nucia.jp/ 2010 10 4 11) 51 (8), 9 16 (2005). 12) American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists (ACGIH) 2007; Threshold Limit Values for chemical Substance and Physical Agents and Biological Exposure Indices. USA. 13) Heiner Brinnel and Michel Cabanac; Tympanic temperature is a core temperature in humans, J. Therm. Biol., 14 (1), 47 53 (1989). 14) 2005 15) D. J. BRAKE and G. P. BATES; Deep body core temperatures in industrial workers under thermal stress, J. Occup. Environ. Med., 44 (2), 125 135 (2002). 16) E. R. NADEL, S. M. HORVATH; Comparison of tympanic memberane and deep body temperatures in man, Life Sci., 9, 869 875 (1970). 1995 MOX E-mail: takahashi.naoki11@jaea.go.jp