PREVALENCE AND WORK-RELATEDNESS OF SELF-REPORTED CARPAL-TUNNEL SYNDROME AMONG UNITED-STATES WORKERS - ANALYSIS OF THE OCCUPATIONAL-HEALTH SUPPLEMENT DATA OF 1988 NATIONAL-HEALTH INTERVIEW SURVEY

To estimate the prevalence and work-relatedness of self-reported carpa l tunnel syndrome (CTS) among U.S. workers, data from the Occupational Health Supplement of 1988 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) wer e analyzed. Among 127 million ''recent workers'' who worked during the 12 months prior to the survey, 1.47% (95% CI: 1.30; 1.65), or 1.87 mi llion self-reported CTS, and 0.53% (95% CI: 0.42; 0.65), or 675,000, s tated that their prolonged hand discomfort was called CTS by a medical person. Occupations with the highest prevalence of self-reported CTS were mail service, health care, construction, and assembly and fabrica tion. Industries with the highest prevalence were food products, repai r services, transportation, and construction. The risk factor most str ongly associated with medically called CTS was exposure to repetitive bending/twisting of the hands/wrists at work (OR = 5.2), followed by r ace (OR = 4.2; whites higher than nonwhites), gender (OR = 2.2; female s higher than males), use of vibrating hand tools (OR = 1.8), and age (OR = 1.03; risk increasing per year). This result is consistent with previous reports in that repeated bending/twisting of the hands and wr ists during manual work is etiologically related to occupational carpa l tunnel syndrome. (C) 1995 Wiley-Liss, Inc.