Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Vol 56, 618-624
PAPERS |
Study of cancer incidence among 6363 male workers in four Norwegian ferromanganese and silicomanganese producing plants
A Hobbesland, H Kjuus and DS Thelle
Telemark Central Hospital, Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Skien, Norway.
OBJECTIVES: Little has been known about the risk of cancer associated with occupational exposure to manganese. The objective of this study was therefore to examine the associations between duration of specific work and cancer incidence among employees in four Norwegian ferromanganese and silicomanganese producing plants. METHODS: Among men first employed in 1933-91 and with at least 6 months in these plants, the incident cases of cancer during 1953-91 were obtained from The Cancer Registry of Norway. The numbers of various cancers were compared with expected figures calculated from age and calendar time specific rates for Norwegian men during the same period. Internal comparisons of rates were performed with Poisson regression analysis. The final cohort comprised 6363 men. RESULTS: A total of 607 cases of cancer were observed against 596 cases expected (standardised incidence ratio (SIR) 1.02). Internal comparisons of rates showed a positive trend between the rate of all cancers and duration of furnace work. A slightly weaker trend was also found for duration of blue collar non-furnace work when lags of 25 or 30 years were applied in the analyses. However, several results indicated that the incidence of all cancers among the non- furnace workers decreased during the period of active employment. CONCLUSIONS: Furnace and non-furnace workers may have exposures that increase the incidence of several cancers. The low incidence of cancer among non-furnace workers during the period of ongoing exposure cannot be explained. As this study cannot identify any causal factors, the role of exposure to manganese remains unclear.
Copyright © 1999 Occupational and Environmental Medicine
CiteULike 
Complore 
Connotea 
Del.icio.us 
Digg 
Reddit 
Technorati What's this?
- Full Text (PDF)
- Submit a response
- Alert me when this article is cited
- Alert me when eLetters are posted
- Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
- Email this link to a friend
- Similar articles in this journal
- Similar articles in PubMed
- Add article to my folders
- Download to citation manager
- Request Permissions
Citing Articles
Google Scholar
PubMed
Bookmark with
Register for free content
The full back archive is now available for all BMJ Journals. Institutional subscribers may access the entire archive as part of their subscription. Personal subscribers will also have access to all content when logged in. Non-subscribers who register have free access to all articles published before 2006 right back to volume 1 issue 1. Register here to access the free archive of all BMJ Journals.
Don't forget to sign up for content alerts so you keep up to date with all the articles as they are published.
