[Spinal pain syndromes in coal miners]

The paper presents an evaluation of spinal pain syndrome prevalence in miners of a Mining Industry Corporation, employing 45 thous of manual workers. The observed population included 34.487 underground workers, and 9.507 surface workers. The distribution of workplaces was based on the degree of the spine load. The number of examined sick workers during one year amounted to 1.600. The authors noted, that the morbidity among underground workers with considerably loaded spine is 1/3 higher and they begin to complain about 5 years earlier than surface workers -- which obviously results from the type and environment of the work. On the other hand no difference was found in the morbidity between underground and surface workers engaged in the work with a middle load of spine, because the type of work is similar in this case and the effects of environment are not significant.