>> Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, or COPD,
affects over 16 million Americans.
COPD causes lung damage that obstructs air flow,
interferes with the lungs taking up oxygen,
and removing carbon dioxide, and produces symptoms
such as productive cough, wheezing,
and exercise limitations due to shortness of breath.
In the U.S., tobacco smoke is the most common exposure
that causes COPD.
About 15% of all COPD cases can be attributed
to workplace exposures such as dust, gases, and chemical fumes.
In this video, people suffering
from COPD will share their real-life stories
and will discuss the importance
of considering work-related exposures
as a potential cause of COPD.
>> I went to work as an underground mechanic,
pump mechanic, and worked hand-in-hand
with the uranium miners.
But when I was working underground,
I was hanging off the bulkhead somewhere,
on one of those little chairs
and all I was breathing was the smoke that I was burning
when I was burning a rod, and the dust that was coming
up because the fans that were there were on the surface,
all the dust came up the shaft.
Past whatever, whoever was there, and got expelled
out the top of the shaft.
So, when I was down there working in a pump station,
welding or whatever, I was breathing that air
that was coming up the shaft and going to the surface.
>> COPD is a serious public health problem
that imposes an enormous burden on individual patients
and the nation's healthcare system.
It is the fourth leading cause of disability,
and also the fourth leading cause
of death in the United States.
Cigarette smoking is the leading cause of COPD,
accounting for 75% of cases.
But there are other causes, including exposure
to air pollutants in the workplace and at home,
genetic factors, and respiratory infections.
Fifteen percent of COPD cases are due
to various airborne exposures at work.
These cases are said to have work-related COPD.
>> At my jobs when I started, I started at ground floor of labor
in the construction business, moved up to working
in building custom homes.
I worked with a lot of different products, you know,
mainly natural woods, and then I, new products would come
out on the market that were composites
and they weren't all natural so when you start cutting
into those products and working with them, there's an amount
of air pollution that goes along with that.
>> I started working about 1964 as an iron worker.
I worked in Los Alamos for, on and off, about 2 or 3 years.
And I did a lot of welding there, I welded iron,
I welded aluminum, I welded stainless steel.
And when you're welding,
sometimes my welding hood would fill up with smoke
and I just kept welding
and maybe take a break once in a while.
But, and then everybody else was welding around there too
so there was a lot of smoke and dust,
because they were doing different things.
>> My work was in transportation
of materials for the government.
When I was a driver, also an agent,
we were around diesel fumes both in our vans
and our semi-tractor trailers.
Where they were loading these vehicles, we'd actually be
in just enclosed areas and sometimes it would be
in North Dakota or someplace like that and you had
to leave the trucks running, otherwise it'd be too cold.
I mean you could actually see the smoke from the stacks
on the trucks and things coming out.
>> Before I retired, I think I was diagnosed with asthma
and then later on I was diagnosed with COPD.
And I believe that was caused by the welding fumes and asbestos
and all the dust I worked with and a lot of different things
that I don't even know what I worked
with because they never told us.
>> If you do have respiratory symptoms,
please don't ignore them.
Please go discuss them with your provider.
Do tell them what you're doing currently
and what you've done in the past.
The latency of this disease can be several decades.
So if you've had a very, for instance,
a very dusty job two decades ago, that may still be relevant
in the causation of symptoms at this point in time.
>> It wasn't until later, oh I would say about 20 years
after I quit mining, that I was diagnosed with COPD.
>> Well, when I first noticed
that I figured something was going on,
I started getting short of breath, you know,
I'd get congested and stuff.
But mainly you start losing your lung capacity.
I noticed that about when I was in my 50's I guess, you know.
I didn't think about, you know, what I was doing to myself
or what my job was even doing to me.
But I was proud of what I did.
>> The advice that I give to physicians
and other providers taking care of patients
with work-related COPD is take these symptoms seriously.
Do ask them the question what is your current job,
what have you done in the past, what were you exposed to?
Because if you don't ask that question,
and we know many physicians don't ask that question,
you will miss the diagnosis of work-related COPD.
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