Abstract:
Construction work is one of the primary drivers of development and economic
activity in Pakistan and people are focusing more on this sector. A variety of activities
are performed at the construction site such as cement mixing, carpentry, painting, and
many more. Workers working in these activities are exposed to toxic heavy metals. Due to
exposure to these heavy metals, subjects are at high risk to develop different diseases
mainly skin and respiratory diseases. Human hair and nail samples of construction
workers were collected in Rawalpindi, Pakistan. Heavy metals Al, As, Cd, Cr, Ni, K, Pb,
and Zn were analyzed in the hair and fingernails of the construction workers. To
determine the level of selected heavy metals, Inductively Coupled Plasma optical
emission spectrometry was used. Results revealed that Al was the highest with mean
concentration 7.54 μg/g whereas Cd was the lowest with mean concentration 0.0 μg/g in
both hair and nails of the subjects. Heavy metal concentration was high in hair (1.77
μg/g) as compared to nails (1.19 μg/g). Moreover, the workers of the carpentry group
have higher HM concentrations when compared to the other two groups, painting and
cement mixing and this group was at high risk of toxic metal exposure. After the
correlation analysis, the results revealed that some of the heavy metals in hair and nails
were significantly correlated with each other.
