ORIGINAL ARTICLE

No association between the use of cellular or cordless telephones and salivary gland tumours

L Hardell¹, A Hallquist², K Hansson Mild³, M Carlberg⁴, H Gertzén⁵, E-B Schildt⁶ and Å Dahlqvist⁷

¹ Department of Oncology, University Hospital, SE-701 85 Örebro and Department of Natural Sciences, Örebro University, SE-701 82 Örebro, Sweden
² Department of Oncology-Pathology, Karolinska Institute, The Hospital of Danderyd, SE-182 88 Stockholm, Sweden
³ National Institute for Working Life, SE-907 13 Umeå and Department of Natural Sciences, Örebro University, SE-701 82 Örebro, Sweden
⁴ Department of Oncology, University Hospital, SE-701 85 Örebro, Sweden
⁵ Department of Otorhinolaryngology, University Hospital, SE-701 85 Örebro, Sweden
⁶ Department of Oncology, University Hospital, S-221 85 Lund, Sweden
⁷ Department of Otorhinolaryngology, University Hospital, SE-901 85 Umeå, Sweden

Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Dr L Hardell
Department of Oncology, University Hospital, SE-701 85 Örebro and Department of Natural Sciences, Örebro University, SE-701 82 Örebro, Sweden; lennart.hardell{at}orebroll.se

Aim: To investigate the association between the use of cellular or cordless telephones and the risk for salivary gland tumours.

Methods: Cases were assessed from the six regional cancer registries in Sweden. Four controls matched for sex and age in five year age groups were selected for each case. A total of 293 living cases and 1172 controls were included.

Results: There were 267 (91%) participating cases and 1053 (90%) controls. Overall no significantly increased risk was found. Odds ratios were 0.92 (95% CI 0.58 to 1.44) for use of analogue phones, 1.01 (95% CI 0.68 to 1.50) for use of digital phones, and 0.99 (95% CI 0.68 to 1.43) for use of cordless phones. Similar results were found for different salivary gland localisations. No effect of tumour induction period or latency was seen, although few subjects reported use for more than 10 years.

Conclusions: No association between the use of cellular or cordless phones and salivary gland tumours was found, although this study does not permit conclusions for long term heavy use.

Abbreviations: CI, confidence interval; GSM, Global System for Mobile Communication; MHz, mega Hertz; NMT, Nordic Mobile Telephone System; OR, odds ratio; RF, radiofrequency

Keywords: parotid gland tumours; mobile telephones

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