EVALUATION OF TREMOR IN ALUMINUM PRODUCTION WORKERS

A cross-sectional study of 63 current and former aluminum potroom work ers and 37 comparison workers was conducted to evaluate for evidence o f neurological dysfunction, including tremor from long-term exposures to aluminum using sensitive quantitative measures of arm/hand and leg tremor. Signs of upper extremity tremor were also evaluated by neurolo gical examination and compared with the quantitative measures of arm/h and tremor. Both arm/hand and leg tremor were measured using fatiguing test conditions, but no statistically significant differences due to exposure to aluminum were present between the potroom workers and the comparison workers. The neurological examination also showed no statis tically significant differences between the groups on the evaluation o f signs of tremor. These results do not support the findings of Best-P ettersen et al., who reported evidence of increased tremor in aluminum workers using the static steadiness test in the Halstead-Reitan batte ry. Differences between the studies that may have contributed to the c ontrasting results are discussed. In addition, techniques are presente d for using microcomputer-controlled devices to evaluate tremor in bot h the visible (1-6 Hz) and nonvisible (7-18 Hz) frequencies of the tre mor spectrum.