Sick building syndrome—A case study

Abstract The problem of ‘sick building syndrome’ was investigated by carrying out a field survey on the library building of the Hong Kong Polytechnic. The environmental conditions, indoor air quality and species of common bacteria were measured for a period of five months. The library staff were interviewed to get their subjective feelings on the environment. Results of this case study were presented and the relationship between those occupants' subjective feeling, indoor environment and prevalence of symptoms was analysed. Measurement results indicated that indoor environmental conditions could generally be maintained up to widely acceptable standards. Yet, feedback from staff did not show the expected consistency.