Epidemiology of occupational skin diseases in Poland in the period 2003–2017

Occupational diseases are characterised by a diverse aetiology. The causative agents may be chemical, physical or biological. In the past 14 years there has been a decrease in the number of reported occupational dermatoses in Poland. In 2017 occupational dermatoses ranked 7th among all occupational diseases, whereas in 2003 they were in the 5th position. There were 1694 recorded cases of cutaneous occupational diseases. The most common entity was allergic contact dermatitis (80.5% of total occupational skin disease cases), while hands were the most frequent location of occupational dermatoses. The number of registered cases of occupational diseases is low compared to other European countries. This indicates that this number may not reflect the true scale of disease incidence and may lead to underestimation of the problem of occupational dermatoses in Poland.