The paper presents the results of a survey of the organization and implementation of preventive medicine programmes in the shoe and leather industries 10 years after the introduction of the National Health Service in Italy. There was a marked difference between the resources available in central and northern Italy where, although unevenly, prevention at the workplace has improved, and the regions of southern Italy were the situation is decidedly less comforting. The methods used by the Occupational Health Services in the territories under study are described, which are characterised by programmed or planned activities (according to industrial sector) mainly aimed at acquiring better knowledge of the risk factors and their effective elimination.