Brain Damage Newsroom

Workplace Lead Exposure Brings Long-Term Brain Damage

The study included 532 former employees who'd worked at a chemical manufacturing plant for an average of eight years. At the time of the study, the workers had not been exposed to lead for an average of 18 years.

The amount of lead accumulated in the workers' bones was measured, and MRI scans were used to measure workers' brain volumes and to look for white matter lesions (small areas of brain tissue damage).

Researchers found that 36 percent of the workers had white matter lesions. The higher their lead levels, the more likely workers were to have smaller brain volumes and greater amounts of brain damage. Workers with the highest levels of lead were more than twice as likely to have brain damage and to have brain volumes 1.1 percent smaller than those with the lowest levels of lead. Read more at healthfinder.gov