Traditionally, occupational research has focused primarily on white men, even though women comprise 46% of the U.S. civilian workforce, and minorities are often employed in jobs with hazardous exposures. The OEB has undertaken a number of epidemiologic studies with a substantial focus in occupation which include women and minorities during the past year. A multicenter case-control study of bladder cancer is launched to examine environmental and occupational risk factors for the consistently elevated incidence and mortality of this cancer in New England. A hospital-based case-control study of kidney cancer with a major focus on occupational exposures is initated in Central and Eastern Europe, while a population-based case-control study of renal cell cancer among Caucasian and African Americans in the United States was initiated last year. Currently a telephone interview survey is updating exposure information in the Agricultural Health Study, a prospective cohort study of more than 90,000 subjects, including approximately 32,000 women and 2,000 minorities. Both direct occupational exposure and indirect environmental exposure to pesticides and other exposures will be evaluated in the study. The Shanghi Women's Study is a prospective cohort study of 75,000 women conducted in collaboration with Vanderbilt University and the Shanghai Cancer Institute. Baseline data collection is completed in Spring, 2000. Blood/buccal cell and urine samples have been collected from nearly 90% of participants. This cohort will provide a valuable resource for evaluation of environmental and genetic risk factors for cancer among women. Analysis are on-going to examine the association of smoking, occupation, diet, and anthrometric measurements with risk of prevalent breast cancer and other chronic conditions. In another on-going prospective cohort study among participants in a screening trial (PLCO Study), about 50,000 women have been enrolled for follow-up studies of cancer risk factors. Other studies are also underway that focus on cancer among hairdressers, aircraft maintenance workers, and drycleaners on the relationships between occupational exposures, particularly pesticides, solvents, and dusts, and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, multiple myeloma, and cancers of the pancreas, brain, and stomach in projects which include women and minorities. Feasibility and methodologic projects were also conducted for the study of cancer among migrant farm workers, the majority of whom are Hispanic. Questionnaires involving an innovative life events-icon method of collecting occupational histories were developed and tested as well as projects to test the ability to trace farm workers over extended periods of time, to study mortality patterns, to evaluate cancer diagnosis and treatment patterns, to assess exposures via biological measures using cord blood, and to add epidemiologic variables to a national data base of information collected from farmworkers who are applying for social services. The materials and methods developed in the feasibility projects will help NCI and others to launch full-scale studies of cancer. In addition, analyses are on-going in several case-control studies that include a large proportion of women and minorities, including a study of occupational and environmental cancer risk factors in Iowa, a 24-State death certificate study, the Swedish cancer-environment linked-registry study, a multicenter study of cancer risks among whites and African Americans, case-control studies of stomach cancer in Mexico and Poland, a case-control study of several gastrointestinal cancers in Shanghai, China, a cohort study of farmers in Xuanwei, China, and a study of oral cancer in Puerto Rico. Recent findings including similar reduction in lung cancer risks following home stove improvement in Xuanwei, and excess risks of cancers of the esophagus, larynx, and lung, and Hogkins disease among dry clearners, the majority of whom were women.
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