Article Text
Abstract
Objective The purpose of this study was to investigate the characteristics of nailfold capillaroscopy associated with hand-arm vibration syndrome (HAVS).
Methods In total, 113 male gold miners were recruited: 35 workers who were chronically exposed to vibration and developed vibration-induced white finger were defined as the HAVS group, 39 workers who were exposed to vibration but did not have HAVS were classified as the vibration-exposed controls (VEC) group, and 39 workers without vibration exposure were categorised as the non-VEC (NVEC) group. Video capillaroscopy was used to capture images of the 2nd, 3rd and 4th fingers of both hands. The following nailfold capillary characteristics were included: number of capillaries/mm, avascular areas, haemorrhages and enlarged capillaries. The experiments were carried out in the same winter. All characteristics were evaluated under blinded conditions.
Results Significant differences in all morphological characteristics existed between the groups (p<0.05). Avascular areas in the HAVS, VEC and NVEC groups appeared in 74.3%, 43.6% and 25.0% of participants, respectively. A higher percentage of participants had haemorrhages in the HAVS group (65.7%) compared with the other groups (VEC: 7.7% and NVEC: 7.5%). The number of capillaries/mm, input limb width, output limb width, apical width, and ratio of output limb and input limb all had more than 70% sensitivity or specificity of their cut-off value.
Conclusions Nailfold capillary characteristics, especially the number of capillaries/mm, avascular areas, haemorrhages, output limb width, input limb width and apical width alterations, revealed significant associations with HAVS.
- Nailfold capillaroscopy
- Hand-arm vibration syndrome
- Vibration-induced white finger
- vascular injuries
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Footnotes
QC and GC authors contributed equally to this work.
Contributors QC and GC conceived of the study and were responsible for the design and search strategy. GC, DZ and BY were responsible for conducting the search. MY and GC conducted the data analysis and interpretation. The initial draft of the manuscript was prepared by QC and GC. All authors provided input to the analysis plans, interpretation of data and critical revision of the successive drafts of the manuscript.
Funding This study was funded by the National Science Foundation of China (NSFC; grant number 81202183); and by the Science and Technology Program of Guangdong, China (STPG; grant number 2013B051000065); and by the Open Projects Program of Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Occupational Disease Prevention and Treatment (grant number 2012A061400007-03).
Competing interests None declared.
Patient consent Obtained.
Ethics approval This study was approved by the Ethical Committee of Guangdong Province Hospital for Occupational Disease Prevention and Treatment.
Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.
Data sharing statement Additional data are available by emailing the corresponding author at qschen@gdoh.org