Industrial Aspects Of Bronchiogenic Neoplasms

Our plain-English summary of Industrial Aspects Of Bronchiogenic Neoplasms, by L. Breslow (1955).

The study

• Author: L. Breslow
• Published: Diseases Of The Chest 28(4):421-430, October (1955)
• Type of article: Journal article
• Our copy: from Johns-Manville's own medical library, J-M no. 001854. The article is still under copyright, so we describe it here rather than post it.

In plain English

The author reported interviews with 518 lung cancer patients and 518 control patients in 11 California hospitals. The controls, matched for age, sex and race, had been admitted for conditions other than cancer or chest disease. Lung cancer patients reported cigarette smoking more often, especially heavy smoking. One hundred twenty cases and 39 controls reported a cough lasting five years or more. The interviews also covered lifelong work histories. Among occupations held for at least five years, groups appearing substantially more often among cases than controls included welders and sheet metal workers doing welding, electric bridge crane operators in the metal industry, construction and maintenance painters, commercial cooks (excluding cannery cooks), and lead, zinc and copper ore extraction workers. Others were marine engineers, firemen, oilers and wipers, and steamfitters, boilermakers and asbestos workers. The author wrote that exposure to metallic particles or fumes, asbestos, paint and other materials appeared to play some role. Analysis of industry and toxic exposure data was not productive. The author treated these findings as a hypothesis, to be tested by following the mortality of about 10,000 persons aged 35-64 in each suspect occupation.

We wrote this plain-English summary from the full article with the help of AI, and a second AI model checked each sentence against the article. It is not the authors' wording; the abstract and the article are their own account.

What the study did and found

• Design: Hospital-based case-control interview study comparing lung cancer patients with matched control patients, presented alongside a discussion of earlier studies of occupation and lung cancer
• Who was studied: 518 lung cancer patients and 518 non-cancer control patients in 11 California hospitals. The controls were admitted for conditions other than cancer and other than chest disease, and were matched for age, sex and race. Study dates are not given.
• Exposure: Cigarette smoking history and lifelong occupational history, with occupations held for at least five years. One occupation group was steamfitters, boilermakers and asbestos workers. No asbestos fiber type is named.
• Main results:
  • Cigarette smoking, especially in excessive amounts, was more frequent among lung cancer patients than among controls.
  • One hundred twenty lung cancer patients reported a cough for five years or more, compared with 39 controls.
  • Among occupations in which cases and controls had spent at least five years, the following groups appeared with substantially greater frequency among lung cancer patients than controls: welders and sheet metal workers doing welding; electric bridge crane operators in the metal industry; construction and maintenance painters; commercial cooks (excluding cannery cooks); workers in the extraction of lead, zinc and copper ore; steamfitters, boilermakers and asbestos workers; and marine engineers, firemen, oilers and wipers.
  • The author wrote that exposure to metallic particles or fumes, asbestos, paint and other materials appeared to play some role.
• The authors' conclusion: The author concluded that several types of employment may be causal factors in lung cancer. The author wrote that this study and others strongly implicate painting, welding and other hot-metal work, commercial cooking, metal mining, steam fitting and other asbestos work. The author described this as a hypothesis that further work would confirm or refute.
• Limitations the authors state:
  • Efforts to analyze the data on type of industry and exposure to known toxic agents were not productive, so the analysis focused on occupation itself.
  • The occupational code used was not designed to reflect common occupational exposures, so occupations had to be regrouped after examining individual records.
  • The occupational findings were treated as needing confirmation. Information was being assembled on approximately 10,000 persons aged 35-64 employed in each of the suspect occupations, whose mortality was to be followed over the next few years.

Topics

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: Neoplasm, Lung Cancer.

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