Women Strategies for Handling Household Detergents in Rafsanjan

Despite positive aspects of wide rang applications of detergents, a large number of these products are attributed to the several consumer's health problems. Women are the most domestic consumers. So in this study, women strategies for handling household detergents were surveyed. In this descriptive study, 349 women from health care centers were selected using stratified Random sampling method and their behaviours for handling household detergents by phone structured interview were surveyed. Data were then analyzed by SPSS software and descriptive statistics, χ2 and Fisher test. In 85% of houses, detergents were Stored in kitchen and 76.5% paid no attention to the detergent’s labels. Only 26.2% always were gloves. The rate of hand dermatitis and respiratory problems due to domestic cleaning was 41.2% and 17.5% respectively. Respiratory complications had a significant relationship with job (p=0.009), socio-economical statues (p=0.03) ignoring of the sefety rules regarding the storing of detersents and poor ventilation of the storing places (p=0.04). Women who mixed detergents without gloves had a higher rate of dermatitis (p=0.000). Handling of household detergents may expose women to the adverse physical and chemical effects of detergents which could be a serious public health concern.