Analysis of medical records of workers and the role of their occupational doctor. Report 1. A study on some impacts of aging of workers according to their health records.
The new "Occupational Safety and Health Act" was established in October 1972. According to the Act, the employers with 50 and more employees were bound to make an occupational health doctor provide health care for the employees within the enterprises. Considering the national background mentioned above, the author examined the actual status of the medical and health care services in order to discuss the professional function of an occupational health doctor by reviewing the records concerning the workers' health at a certain paper factory managed by the National Government, under the Government Health Insurance scheme. The results were as follows: 1) Aging of the workers had an important impact on medical service and health care provided. 2) The medical service by the occupational doctor attached to the factory differed much from that by other medical institutions outside the factory in several points; particularly in days of receiving medical consultation, medical expenditure expressed in "point score," number of injections given and the frequency of laboratory examinations. 3) as a whole, the occupational health doctor was taking a role as "the first contact doctor" in primary medical care, as well as a health officer preventing disease and promoting health in the factory, whereas the medical institutions outside the factory were rather clinically oriented in treating ill-health.
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D005260:Female; D005102:Health Expenditures; D006801:Humans; D007564:Japan; D008297:Male; D008499:Medical Records; D008875:Middle Aged; D009017:Morbidity; D009786:Occupational Health Services / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D009787:Occupational Medicine; D013222:State Medicine