Improving job satisfaction with different intervention methods among the school personnel in Estonia and Latvia

ArticleThis investigation was carried out in two high schools: one in Estonia (EST1) and one in Latvia (LAT1). The offices EST2 and LAT2 were chosen from the countryside of the both countries. Office EST1 is situated in an atrium-type building for educational and research needs. The second building is mainly for education (auditoriums) and the offices LAT1 are situated on the ground floor. The third and the fourth offices were taken for comparison. Office EST2 is situated in a countryside in an old wooden building; the fourth office LAT2 is located in a new building in Latvian countryside. All together 181 office-workers were involved. At first, the work environment conditions were measured. The ergonomics of workplaces was assessed with ARTtool and Kiva-questionnaire was used to study psychosocial conditions and job satisfaction at computer-equipped workplaces. Occupational hazards were measured to clarify, do the work environment influence on the behaviour and the job motivation and satisfaction of the worker at workplace? After the first questioning of workers using Kiva-questionnaire, the Metal Age programme was implemented and after the intervention, the Kiva-questionnaire was carried out again. The results showed that if the preventive measures for solving the problems at workplace are implemented, and the employers and the employees are trained and consulted using the appropriate programmes, the stress situations could be avoided. The workers in all offices were confident that the discussion about the problems is very important as the work with computers is intensive and there is a very short time to communicate with each other. The educational work is also stressful

Prevention the impact of chemicals on the health of workers in fibreglass industry

ArticleMost of the chemicals make our everyday life easier and safer. However, there are a lot of new emerging risks connected with chemicals causing damage to people’s health and environment. The results of the investigation: the chemical exposure index (EI) is between 0.16 to 25.98 (the last determined by the mould spray-up, outside of the protective masks). The air pollution index determined was between 16 to 760%. The ventilation rates for the remove of the volatiles from the workplace air are settled, the possibilities for substitution of hazardous chemicals to less hazardous are presented. When the concentration of a volatile is measured under the protective mask, which has a new filter, the tested substance concentration is lower that under the mask with an old filter, although the differences between these two were rather small. When the volatiles were measured under the protective mask, the concentrations of tested substances met the requirements