THE ASSOCIATION BETWEEN BMI AND HEMOGLOBIN AND WORK PRODUCTIVITY AMONG INDONESIAN FEMALE FACTORY-WORKERS

Objective: To investigate the relationship between body mass index (BM I), haemoglobin (Kb) concentration and work productivity in Indonesian female industrial workers engaged in cigarette rolling. Design: Rando mized-stratified, cross-sectional study. Setting: A clove cigarette fa ctory in Central Java Province, Indonesia. Subjects: Two-hundred and t hirty female cigarette-rollers. Methods: Anthropometric variables (hei ght, weight, mid-upper arm circumference, BMI), body composition (lean body mass and fat mass from skinfolds thicknesses), Kb, work producti vity (cigarettes/hour) were determined. Results: Of the 230 selected s ubjects 40.4% were anaemic and 41.3% had BMI < 18.5. Average productio n was 620 +/- 86 cigarettes/h. Productivity was positively correlated with work experience (r = 0.214, P < 0.01), lean body mass (r = 0.183, P < 0.01), height (r = 0.150, P < 0.05), Hb (r = 0.141, P < 0.05), an d arm muscle area (r = 0.120, P < 0.05). Anaemic subjects produced 4.9 % less (P. < 0.01) than the non-anaemic ones. No linear relationship e xisted between BMI and productivity, but subjects with a BMI < 18.5, o r < 17.0, produced respectively 5.1% (P < 0.05) and 6.8% (P < 0.05) le ss than subjects with BMI between 18.5-22.5. Conclusions: Work product ivity of persons with low BMI and Hb may be reduced. However, BMI was not a good screening tool to detect low producers. When using BMI < 18 .5 and a production < 550 cigarettes/h as cut-offs sensitivity (64.7%) and specificity (55.5%) were low.