8291675 Inventory and catalogue of occupational exposure and health data in The Netherlands

<h3>Objective</h3> Although a wide variety of occupational exposure and health data are available online and within institutes and universities, these data sources are fragmented and hard to find for researchers working on prevention of occupational diseases. The Dutch LEXCES project aims to increase the usability of relevant occupational exposure and health data, including data that is not readily findable, by creating a comprehensive inventory. <h3>Methods</h3> Data sources were inventoried based on consultation of relevant literature, internet search and interviews with researchers with a focus on datasets from The Netherlands. To facilitate findability and reuse, the data sources were described using a selection of relevant metadata elements from standard vocabularies. A catalogue was built to browse and search data sources, making the datasets findable for all relevant stakeholders. <h3>Results</h3> The initial inventory yielded over 60 data sources relevant in the context of occupational exposure and health. With some overlap in domains, the majority of datasets were related to the characterization of hazardous substances (n=42), while data sources describing mechanism of effect (n=7), production and use (n=6), occupational exposure (n=8), occupational diseases (n=5) and individual and societal burden of disease (n=2) were more sparse. Metadata was not always sufficiently available to enable efficient evaluation of accessibility and usability of the data. <h3>Conclusion</h3> The project shows that a large number of data sources is available for use within occupational exposure and health. However, for some domains only a few data sources are identified, e.g. with regard to data on occupational exposure, which is crucial for modeling disease risk. The catalogue will be publicly available and future efforts should be aimed at adding new data sources, for instance by inviting stakeholders to add relevant sources.