Annals of Occupational and Environmental Medicine

Case Report

Mental health impact on a humidifier disinfectant disaster victim: a case report: Ye-Sung Lee, Min-Woo Nam, Hyun-Il Kim, Hyeong-Cheol Kim, Eun-Chan Mun, So-Young Park; Ann Occup Environ Med 2020;32:e15. Published online June 1, 2020; DOI: https://doi.org/10.35371/aoem.2020.32.e15

In Korea, the cause of lung disease of unknown origin was identified as humidifier disinfectants in November 2011. In February 2017, the ‘Special Act on Remedy for Damage Caused by Humidifier Disinfectants’ was promulgated. Even though emotional and mental injuries caused by humidifier disinfectants have been reported, the focus of the special act has been on physical injury only, and criteria for recognizing mental health impact have not been considered. This case considers emotional and mental injury caused by humidifier disinfectants. After a humidifier disinfectant was used from January 2005 to April 2006, the patient's son aged 20 months was hospitalized with respiratory symptoms, and he died within two weeks. Also, the patient was hospitalized for a month with the same symptoms, and then she led a normal life with no symptoms. After both mother and son were diagnosed with definite (level 1) humidifier disinfectant lung injury (HDLI) in 2017, she took to drinking alcohol because of extreme guilt over her son's death. In March 2018 she died from acute liver failure due to alcohol use disorder. The patient's death was caused by continuous alcoholism, due to emotional and mental trauma caused by her son's death after HDLI was revealed as the cause. The government did not acknowledge her death was due to humidifier disinfectants, but the company that sold the humidifier disinfectants recognized her as a victim and compensated the family of the victim. There are still lots of psychological responses among humidifier disinfectant disaster victims. Mental health impact on humidifier disinfectant victims should be considered more carefully, and institutional improvements should be made into establish psychological interventions and measures.

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Case Report

Problems with diagnostic criteria for humidifier disinfectant lung injury (HDLI): two cases of radiologically improved HDLI: Min-Woo Nam, So-Young Park, Byung-Seong Suh, Soo-Youn Ham, Kyung-Hun Son, Hyunil Kim, Hyeong-Cheol Kim; Ann Occup Environ Med 2020;32:e1. Published online January 2, 2020; DOI: https://doi.org/10.35371/aoem.2020.32.e1

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Background

In Korea, to investigate the casual relationship between humidifier disinfectant and lung disease, four rounds of investigation and judgment were conducted. During this investigation, two adults who performed lung biopsy were recognized for their relevance between humidifier disinfectants and lung disease. At first, we did not think of the relationship to humidifier disinfectant because chest computed tomography (CT) finding of 2 cases were improved. However, they performed lung biopsy and it showed typical humidifier disinfectant lung injury (HDLI) pathologic findings, they could be recognized as HDLI. We report these cases here.

Case presentation

We selected 2 cases from the fourth-round investigation at Kangbuk Samsung Hospital. Patient of case 1 used humidifier disinfectants since September 2010. The patient was admitted 6 months later to the intensive care unit (ICU) due to severe dyspnea. Pathology following a lung biopsy revealed typical HDLI finding which was determined to be due to humidifier disinfectant exposure. Patient of case 2 used humidifier disinfectant from 2001 to 2008 for about 3 months each winter. The patient's cough and sputum production symptoms began in December of 2007. The patient was admitted to the respiratory medicine department due to worsening dyspnea. Pathology following a lung biopsy revealed typical HDLI finding. This was determined to have been caused by humidifier disinfectant exposure.

Conclusions

Because the typical radiologic findings associated with HDLI can improve over time, it is necessary to consider the revision of current diagnostic criteria that the presence of radiologic findings is important.

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Journal of Korean Medical Science.2022;[Epub] CrossRef
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Yeong Jun Ju, Seungho Lee, Seungsoo Sheen, Dong-Woo Choi, Jong-Han Leem, Soon Young Lee
Epidemiology and Health.2021; 43: e2021091. CrossRef

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