Chest
Occupational and Environmental Lung DiseaseAccelerated Lung Function Decline in Swine Confinement Workers
Section snippets
Materials and Methods
The methods of population selection, data collection, and data analysis for the baseline observations conducted in 1990 and 1991 have been described previously.3, 15 Briefly, all swine operations in the central area of the province of Saskatchewan with annual sales of at least 200 hogs in 1988 were identified from documentation provided by the Saskatchewan Pork Producers Marketing Board. After excluding the swine operations from Hutterite Colonies and swine operations with less than 200 pigs,
Results
As shown in Table 1, the swine confinement workers were significantly younger than the nonfarmers (p<0.001) and the grain farmers (p<0.001). The only significant difference in mean weights was between nonfarming control subjects and grain farmers (p = 0.05). When we examined the follow-up of nonsmokers, current smokers, and former smokers, unavailability of follow-up of smokers was greater in nonfarming control subjects (33/79, 41.8%) than in swine confinement workers (11/41, 26.8%) and grain
Discussion
This is the third study, of which we are aware, in which longitudinal evaluation of swine farmers has taken place following cross-sectional observations. The Ontario cross-sectional study did not find marked differences between swine farmers and dairy farmers,14 but longitudinal observations demonstrated a work association with increased reporting of symptoms on exposure to swine, molds, and grains.17 An early cross-sectional study by Donham et al1 in Iowa did not reveal differences in baseline
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This study was supported by a grant from the National Health and Research Development Program (NHRDP), Health Canada.