Monday, March 8, 2010

The Many Jobs of Occupational Medicine in Brueni

Occupational Medicine physicians in Brunei have a tough job. In the US, we have the luxury of having industrial hygienist who do work site and environmental assessments.Physicians will go along if time/motivation permits. We have a state department of Labor and Industry (as imperfect as they may be) that will perform an ergonomics evaluation for a patient if needed. And we have medical assistants who take vitals... I could go on.

Every week, Dr. Balalla and his staff do site visits for public and private industry. Currently, there is no requirement for the companies to comply with recommendations, but recently passed legislation will change that. Last week I went on site visit to the Butra Heidelberg Cement factory in Maura (Eastern Brunei), which is about a 30 min drive from Bandar Seri Bagawan (the Capitol). They import about 4500 tons of clinker and 1500 tons of gympsum per day. In case you were wondering, clinker is a pebbly rock-like substance that is made by heating limestone and other raw materials to a very high temperature in a kiln. Limestone is the primary material used to make it. I love Wikipedia! Anyway, construction is a major industry in Brueni and employs more people than any other industry.

I was impressed by the health and safety promotion within the plant, however a very dusty job and not everyone working in all this dust wore a respirator. It was a really hot day to walk around a cement factory in long pants/sleeves with a hardhat and face mask!


The inspection started at the dock where the clinker and gypsum is unloaded from the ship then transported into super large grinders. Eventually, it's bagged and shipped off to distributors.




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