Research on Biomagnetic Technique Used for Tracing Pneumoconiosis of Metallurgical Workers

Abstract

There are many workers in metallurgical factories suffering from silicosis. So far there is not a diagnostic method which may be able to examine the patients’ conditions exactly. Luckily, iron oxide always in the dusts of metallurgical factories and can be considered to serve as a natural tracer; it gives an opportunity to apply the biomagnetic technique to tracing silicosis. Baigang et al.(1987a, b) reported that the silicosis of animals caused the mean relaxation parameter Q (defined in Fig. 1) to decrease and clearance caused Q to increase; the parameter Q was more sensitive to the animals’ silicosis than relaxation rate. Aming to determine the relationship between relaxation parameters and pneumoconiosis state, we studied 36 workers of an iron-ore sintering workshop in the Ben Xi Iron and Steel Corporation.