Journal of School of Public Health and

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In this study, parameters affecting on SPE of trance trance muconic acid (t,t-MA), including sample pH, sample concentration, sample volume, sample flow rate, washing solvent, elution solvent, and type of sorbent were evaluated. After sample preparation of muconic acid as urinary metabolite of benzene, it was determined by HPLC-UV. In chromatographic analysis, column was C18 (250 cm × 4.6 mm id, 0.5 µm), UV wave length was 259 nm, mobile phase was H2O/methanol/acetic acid (69:30:1 v/v/v) was run at flow rate of 1 ml/min. Through experimental evaluation, a strong anion exchange silica cartridge (SAX) has been found successful in simplifying sample preparation compare to C8 and C18. There were significant difference between recoverie of muconic acid when different washing solvent, sample volume, and sample flow rate were used (p< 0.001). An optimum recovery was obtained when sample pH was adjusted at seven. Other optimum conditions were: sample flow rate 1 ml/min washing solvent acetic acid 1% , and acetic acid 10% as elution solvent. In this study, there was no significant difference when different sample concentrations were used (p>0.05). Recovery of spiked urine sample at concentrations of 0.1, 1, 10 µg/ml were more than 95%. The limit of detection of the optimized method was 0.01 µg/ml, showing 20 times less than biological exposure index (BEI). The optimized method was then validated with three different pools of samples at above mentioned concentrations and showed a good reproducibility over six consecutive days as well as six within-days experiments.

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  Background and Aim: Work ability reflects the interactions among personal characteristics, working conditions, employees' functional capabilities, and also employees' health status. Hence, the aim of the present study was to provide the Farsi version of Work Ability Index and to validate it among Iranian workers.

  Materials and Methods: In the first stage, Backward Translation method was used for linguistic validation of the questionnaire. Cross sectional survey of a sample of 645 workers from some Iranian companies were conducted. The study estimated the reliability of the questionnaire by means of test-retest, as well as the construct validity using factor analysis. In order to determine discriminant capacity, the mean scores of different dimensions of work ability index were compared between workers with and without sick leave.

  Results: Accordingly, the questionnaire showed a good internal consistency. ICC coefficients for the questionnaire were acceptable. Moreover, factor analyses related to the questionnaire items indicated that only one question is sufficient for each item of "work ability in relation to the demands of the job" and "mental resources". Also, questions related to the item of "number of current diseases diagnosed by physician" can be integrated in six questions. A good level of discriminant validity was observed for all dimensions except for the item of "work ability regarding work demands".

  Conclusion: According to the acceptable validity and reliability of Work Ability Index, obtained in the present study, using this questionnaire for evaluating workers' work ability in all Iranian work environments, especially in industrial settings, is recommended.

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Background and Aim: Delays in childbearing, in addition to creating health risks for the mother and the child, may lead to permanent parental bereavement. The purpose of this study was psychometric assessment of the validity and reliability of the Iranian version of attitude toward reproductive and childbearing inventory (ATRCI) in women without a history of pregnancy.
Materials and Methods: This study was done on 235 women without a history of pregnancy selected by multi-stage sampling in the South of Iran. They completed a fertility and childbearing attitude questionnaire. The validity and reliabilty of the ATRCI were determined using SPSS-16 software, the statitical tests being Cronbach's alpha coefficient and exploratory factor analysis.
Results: The mean age of the women was 24.47 ± 4.1 years, and the Cronbach's alpha total coefficient was 0.888. The KMO and Bartlett's test of sphericity value (0.890) was  significant.
In this study, in addition to the main components of the questionnaire, the childbirth postponement component was also extracted; they explained  63.01% of the total variance related the attitude toward fertility and childbearing. 
Conclusion:  The 4-component Iranian version of the attitude toward fertility and childbearing inventory was found to have acceptable psychometric validity and reliability. It is recommended that in the future studies this inventory be used in intervantional studies and heath and demographic programs for women without a history of pregnancy.