VISITING BAGS - A LABILE THERMAL ENVIRONMENT

Objective-To define usual colour and site of storage of visiting bags in general practitioners' cars and to investigate effect of these vari ables on temperature inside bag. Design-Questionnaire to general pract itioners; serial temperature measurements from paired black visiting b ags at different storage sites and from bags of different colour. Sett ing-South Devon coastal town during May and June. Subjects-200 general practitioners, of whom 145 returned legible questionnaires. Main outc ome measures-Bag colour, duration and site of storage, temperature ins ide black bags at defined storage sites, and effects of bag colour on internal temperature. Results-111 (77%) of the general practitioners c arried a black visiting bag, and 76 kept their bag in their car all da y. The bag was coolest in the car boot, but irrespective of storage si te, maximum internal temperature of the bag was always over 25-degrees -C and reached up to 80-degrees-C. Spraying a black bag silver signifi cantly reduced the bag's internal temperature (mean difference 8.37-de grees-C (95% confidence interval 6.68 to 9.86-degrees-C) df=59, t=10.2 9, P<0.001). Conclusions-General practitioners should use a silver col oured visiting bag; when visiting, they should store it in their car b oot; at other times they should remove it to a cooler site.