Occup Environ Med 2000;57:126-132 ( February )

Performance of population specific job exposure matrices (JEMs): European collaborative analyses on occupational risk factors for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease with job exposure matrices (ECOJEM)

N Le Moual^a, P Bakke^b, E Orlowski^a, D Heederik^c, H Kromhout^c, S M Kennedy^d, B Rijcken^e, F Kauffmann^a

^a INSERM Epidemiology and Biostatistics Unit 472, Villejuif, France, ^b Department Thoracic Medicine, Bergen, Norway, ^c Environmental and Occupational Health Group, Wageningen University, The Netherlands, ^d Occupational Hygiene Program, University of British Columbia, Canada, ^e Department of Epidemiology, Groningen, The Netherlands

Correspondence to: Ms N Le Moual, INSERM U472, 16 Avenue Paul Vaillant Couturier, F-94807 Villejuif cedex, France

Accepted 27 September 1999

OBJECTIVESTo compare the performance of population specific job exposure matrices (JEMs) and self reported occupational exposure with data on exposure and lung function from three European general populations.
METHODSSelf reported occupational exposure (yes or no) and present occupation were recorded in the three general population surveys conducted in France, The Netherlands, and Norway. Analysis was performed on subjects, aged 25-64, who provided good forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV₁) tracings and whose occupations were performed by at least two people, in the French (6217 men and 5571 women), the Dutch (men from urban (854) and rural (780) areas), and the Norwegian (395 men) surveys. Two population specific JEMs, based on the percentage of subjects who reported themselves exposed in each job, were constructed for each survey and each sex. The first matrix classified jobs into three categories of exposure according to the proportion of subjects who reported themselves exposed in each job (P10-50 JEM, low < 10%, moderate 10-49%, high  50%). For the second matrix, a dichotomous variable was constructed to have the same statistical power as the self reported exposurethat is, the exposure prevalence (p) was the same with both exposure assessment methods (Pp JEM). Relations between occupational exposure, as estimated by the two JEMs and self reported exposure, and age, height, city, and smoking adjusted FEV₁ score were compared.
RESULTSSignificant associations between occupational exposure estimated by the population specific JEM and lung function were found in the French and the rural Dutch surveys, whereas no significant relation was found with self reported exposure. In populations with few subjects in most jobs, exposure cannot be estimated with sufficient precision by a population specific JEM, which may explain the lack of relation in the Norwegian and the Dutch (urban area) surveys.
CONCLUSIONThe population specific JEM, which was easy to construct and cost little, seemed to perform better than crude self reported exposures, in populations with sufficient numbers of subjects per job.


Keywords: job exposure matrix; occupational exposure; lung function

---

© 2000 by Occupational and Environmental Medicine
CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    What's this?

This article has been cited by other articles:

• Quinlan, P J, Earnest, G, Eisner, M D, Yelin, E H, Katz, P P, Balmes, J R, Blanc, P D (2009). Performance of self-reported occupational exposure compared to a job-exposure matrix approach in asthma and chronic rhinitis. Occup. Environ. Med. 66: 154-160 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Delclos, G. L., Gimeno, D., Arif, A. A., Benavides, F. G., Zock, J.-P. (2009). Occupational Exposures and Asthma in Health-Care Workers: Comparison of Self-Reports With a Workplace-Specific Job Exposure Matrix. Am J Epidemiol 169: 581-587 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Kennedy, S. M., Chambers, R., Du, W., Dimich-Ward, H. (2007). Environmental and Occupational Exposures: Do They Affect Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease Differently in Women and Men?. Proc Am Thorac Soc 4: 692-694 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Filleul, L, Rondeau, V, Vandentorren, S, Le Moual, N, Cantagrel, A, Annesi-Maesano, I, Charpin, D, Declercq, C, Neukirch, F, Paris, C, Vervloet, D, Brochard, P, Tessier, J-F, Kauffmann, F, Baldi, I (2005). Twenty five year mortality and air pollution: results from the French PAARC survey. Occup. Environ. Med. 62: 453-460 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Le Moual, N., Kennedy, S. M., Kauffmann, F. (2004). Occupational Exposures and Asthma in 14,000 Adults from the General Population. Am J Epidemiol 160: 1108-1116 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Vandentorren, S., Baldi, I., Annesi Maesano, I., Charpin, D., Neukirch, F., Filleul, L., Cantagrel, A., Tessier, J.F. (2003). Long-term mortality among adults with or without asthma in the PAARC study. Eur Respir J 21: 462-467 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Teschke, K, Olshan, A F, Daniels, J L, De Roos, A J, Parks, C G, Schulz, M, Vaughan, T L, Kromhout, H (2002). Occupational exposure assessment in case-control studies: opportunities for improvement. Occup. Environ. Med. 59: 575-594 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Kennedy, S. M, Le Moual, N., Choudat, D., Kauffmann, F. (2000). Development of an asthma specific job exposure matrix and its application in the epidemiological study of genetics and environment in asthma (EGEA). Occup. Environ. Med. 57: 635-641 [Abstract] [Full Text]