[Effect of physically hard labor on the locomotor system--results of an epidemiological cross-sectional study of resin tappers].

Resin tapping involves a high physical workload. We found the mean working-energy expenditure to be 21 +/- 5 kJ min-1. The mean heart-rate amounted to 127 +/- 18 beats min-1. It is the upper extremities where the work-related strain is particularly high. The clinical, function-diagnostic and X-ray examinations (X-ray only for resin tappers) covered 110 resin tappers and a control group of the same size (for pair-matching purposes). The main finding of the examinations was that both the pain and the degree of elbow-joint arthrosis deformans significantly increase in the course of the work years in resin tapping. Arthrosis deformans of the elbow joints is regarded by us to be a "resin-tapping related health risk", which is found in one in four resin tappers after about 18 work years.