Skip to main content

Occupational hazards account for more than one in ten people with range of lung diseases

More than 1 in 10 people with a range of non-cancerous lung diseases may be sick as a result of inhaling vapors, gas, dust or fumes at work, according to a joint American Thoracic Society and the European Respiratory Society statement published in the ATS's American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.
In "The Occupational Burden of Nonmalignant Respiratory Diseases: An Official American Thoracic Society and European Respiratory Society Statement," 13 clinical and research experts from the two respiratory societies analyzed scores of studies of the connections between occupational hazards and lung disease. The studies were conducted around the world over more than two decades.
The authors included a range of respiratory conditions, ranging from asthma and COPD to scarring fibrosis and selected infections. They did not study cancer of the lung and pleura, the membrane surrounding the lungs, because the occupational burden for those conditions, which can be substantial, has already been reported. Similarly, they did not include in their burden estimate asbestosis, silicosis and coal workers' pneumoconiosis (black lung), because those conditions are entirely work-related.
"The role of occupational factors in most lung disease is under-recognized," said Paul D. Blanc, MD, MSPH, chief of the Division of Occupational and Environmental Medicine at the University of California San Francisco, who along with Carrie A. Redlich, MD, MPH, director of the Occupational and Environmental Medicine Program at Yale University, led the group effort. "Failure to appreciate the importance of work-related factors in such conditions impedes diagnosis, treatment and, most importantly of all, prevention of further disease."
Specifically, the authors estimated the occupational burden of these lung diseases:
  • Asthma, 16 percent
  • Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) 14 percent
  • Chronic bronchitis, 13 percent
  • Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, 26 percent
  • Hypersensitivity pneumonitis, 19 percent
  • Sarcoidosis and other granulomatous disease, 30 percent
  • Pulmonary alveolar proteinosis, 29 percent
  • Community-acquired pneumonia (in working-age adults), 10 percent
  • Tuberculosis (in silica dust-exposed workers), 2 percent.
Dr. Blanc said that some of these findings, particularly those for asthma and COPD, reinforce earlier burden estimates. Other estimates, such as those for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis and community-acquired pneumonia in working-age adults, highlight "a newly appreciated magnitude of risk."
Dr. Blanc added that the authors hope that the statement will cause clinicians to consider not just the respiratory condition but also the patient's occupation and "will move policy makers to take seriously the prevention of such diseases among working women and men around the globe."
Story Source:
Materials provided by American Thoracic Society. 
Note: Content may be edited.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Dark matter may be older than the Big Bang

Dark matter, which researchers believe make up about 80% of the universe's mass, is one of the most elusive mysteries in modern physics. What exactly it is and how it came to be is a mystery, but a new Johns Hopkins University study now suggests that dark matter may have existed before the Big Bang. The study, published August 7 in  Physical Review Letters , presents a new idea of how dark matter was born and how to identify it with astronomical observations. "The study revealed a new connection between particle physics and astronomy. If dark matter consists of new particles that were born before the Big Bang, they affect the way galaxies are distributed in the sky in a unique way. This connection may be used to reveal their identity and make conclusions about the times before the Big Bang too," says Tommi Tenkanen, a postdoctoral fellow in Physics and Astronomy at the Johns Hopkins University and the study's author. While not much is known about its origins,...
Post a Comment
Read more

Home births as safe as hospital births: International study suggests

A large international study led by McMaster University shows that low risk pregnant women who intend to give birth at home have no increased chance of the baby's perinatal or neonatal death compared to other low risk women who intend to give birth in a hospital. The results have been published by  The Lancet 's  EClinicalMedicine  journal. "More women in well-resourced countries are choosing birth at home, but concerns have persisted about their safety," said Eileen Hutton, professor emeritus of obstetrics and gynecology at McMaster, founding director of the McMaster Midwifery Research Centre and first author of the paper. "This research clearly demonstrates the risk is no different when the birth is intended to be at home or in hospital." The study examined the safety of place of birth by reporting on the risk of death at the time of birth or within the first four weeks, and found no clinically important or statistically different risk between home...
Post a Comment
Read more

GSAT-11 satellite to be launched from French Guiana on Dec 5th

GSAT-11 satellite to be launched from French Guiana on Dec 5th GSAT-11 would be located at 74 East and is the fore-runner in a series of advanced communications satellite with multi-spot beam antenna coverage over Indian mainland and Islands, ISRO said. GSAT-11 is the next generation “high throughput” communication satellite configured around ISRO’s I-6K Bus. (PTI/Representational). Indian space agency ISRO is scheduled to launch GSAT-11, the “heaviest” satellite built by it, on-board Ariane-5 rocket of Arianespace from French Guiana on December 5. Weighing about 5,854 kg, GSAT-11 would play a vital role in providing broadband services across the country, and also provide a platform to demonstrate new generation applications, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said. It is the “heaviest” satellite built by ISRO, the space agency said. GSAT-11 is the next generation “high throughput” communication satellite configured around ISRO’s  I-6K Bus, and it...
Post a Comment
Read more