Breast cancer and occupational exposures in women in Finland

✍ Scribed by Elisabete Weiderpass; Eero Pukkala; Timo Kauppinen; Pertti Mutanen; Harri Paakkulainen; Kaisa Vasama-Neuvonen; Paolo Boffetta; Timo Partanen

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1999
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 87 KB
• Volume: 36
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0271-3586
• DOI: 10.1002/(sici)1097-0274(199907)36:1<48::aid-ajim7>3.0.co;2-2

✦ Synopsis

Background:

The etiology of breast cancer is not fully understood. environmental and occupational exposures may contribute to breast cancer risk.

Methods:

We linked 324 job titles from the 1970 census of 892,591 finnish women with incidence of breast cancer (23,638 cases) during 1971-1995. we converted job titles to 31 chemical and two ergonomic agents through a measurement-based, period-specific, national job-exposure matrix. poisson regression models were fit to the data, with adjustment for birth cohort, follow-up period, socioeconomic status, mean number of children, mean age at first delivery, and turnover rate.

Results:

For premenopausal breast cancer, medium/high level of occupational exposure to ionizing radiation was associated with a standardized incidence ratio (sir) of 1.3 (95% confidence interval (ci) 0.7-2.5; trend p = 0.03). for postmenopausal breast cancer, we found on sir of 1.2 (1.1-1.3) for low level and 1.4 (1.1-1.8) for medium/high level of ionizing radiation (trend p = 0.001); and an sir 1.3 (1.1-1.7) for medium/high levels of both asbestos and man-made vitreous fibers. aromatic hydrocarbon solvents showed a significant trend for a modest excess of postmenopausal breast cancer.

Conclusions:

Our study indicates that occupational exposure to ionizing radiation may be associated with an increased risk of female breast cancer. high-quality studies on environmental and occupational etiology of breast cancer are needed for further elucidation of risk factors.