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Cancer prevalence among flight attendants compared to the general population.

ABSTRACT: Flight attendants are an understudied occupational group, despite undergoing a wide range of adverse job-related exposures, including to known carcinogens. In our study, we aimed to characterize the prevalence of cancer diagnoses among U.S. cabin crew relative to the general population.In 2014-2015, we surveyed participants of the Harvard Flight Attendant Health Study. We compared the prevalence of their self-reported cancer diagnoses to a contemporaneous cohort in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES 2013-2014) using age-weighted standardized prevalence ratios (SPRs). We also analyzed associations between job tenure and the prevalence of selected cancers, using logistic regression and adjusting for potential confounders.Compared to NHANES participants with a similar socioeconomic status (n?=?2729), flight attendants (n?=?5366) had a higher prevalence of every cancer we examined, especially breast cancer, melanoma, and non-melanoma skin cancer among females. SPR for these conditions were 1.51 (95% CI: 1.02, 2.24), 2.27 (95% CI: 1.27, 4.06), and 4.09 (95% CI: 2.70, 6.20), respectively. Job tenure was positively related to non-melanoma skin cancer among females, with borderline associations for melanoma and non-melanoma skin cancers among males. Consistent with previous studies, we observed associations between job tenure and breast cancer among women who had three or more children.We observed higher rates of specific cancers in flight attendants compared the general population, some of which were related to job tenure. Our results should be interpreted in light of self-reported health information and a cross-sectional study design. Future longitudinal studies should evaluate associations between specific exposures and cancers among cabin crew.

SUBMITTER: McNeely E

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6019786 | biostudies-other | 2018 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-other

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Cancer prevalence among flight attendants compared to the general population.

McNeely Eileen E Mordukhovich Irina I Staffa Steven S Tideman Samuel S Gale Sara S Coull Brent B

Environmental health : a global access science source 20180626 1

<h4>Background</h4>Flight attendants are an understudied occupational group, despite undergoing a wide range of adverse job-related exposures, including to known carcinogens. In our study, we aimed to characterize the prevalence of cancer diagnoses among U.S. cabin crew relative to the general population.<h4>Methods</h4>In 2014-2015, we surveyed participants of the Harvard Flight Attendant Health Study. We compared the prevalence of their self-reported cancer diagnoses to a contemporaneous cohor ...[more]

PMID: 29940975

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Project description:Few studies have examined the broad health effects of occupational exposures in flight attendants apart from disease-specific morbidity and mortality studies. We describe the health status of flight attendants and compare it to the U.S. population. In addition, we explore whether the prevalence of major health conditions in flight attendants is associated with length of exposure to the aircraft environment using job tenure as a proxy.We surveyed flight attendants from two domestic U.S. airlines in 2007 and compared the prevalence of their health conditions to contemporaneous cohorts in the National Health and Nutrition Survey (NHANES), 2005-2006 and 2007-2008. We weighted the prevalence of flight attendant conditions to match the age distribution in the NHANES and compared the two populations stratified by gender using the Standardized Prevalence Ratio (SPR). For leading health conditions in flight attendants, we analyzed the association between job tenure and health outcomes in logistic regression models.Compared to the NHANES population (n =5,713), flight attendants (n?=?4,011) had about a 3-fold increase in the age-adjusted prevalence of chronic bronchitis despite considerably lower levels of smoking. In addition, the prevalence of cardiac disease in female flight attendants was 3.5 times greater than the general population while their prevalence of hypertension and being overweight was significantly lower. Flight attendants reported 2 to 5.7 times more sleep disorders, depression, and fatigue, than the general population. Female flight attendants reported 34% more reproductive cancers. Health conditions that increased with longer job tenure as a flight attendant were chronic bronchitis, heart disease in females, skin cancer, hearing loss, depression and anxiety, even after adjusting for age, gender, body mass index (BMI), education, and smoking.This study found higher rates of specific diseases in flight attendants than the general population. Longer tenure appears to explain some of the higher disease prevalence. Conclusions are limited by the cross-sectional design and recall bias. Further study is needed to determine the source of risk and to elucidate specific exposure-disease relationships over time.

Project description:BackgroundIt is unknown whether a history of childhood cancer modifies the established disparities in cardiovascular risk factors (CVRFs) observed in the general population.ObjectivesWe sought to determine if disparities in CVRFs by race/ethnicity are similar among childhood cancer survivors compared with the general population.MethodsThe Childhood Cancer Survivor Study (CCSS) is a retrospective cohort with a longitudinal follow-up of 24,084 5-year survivors diagnosed between 1970 and 1999. Multivariable piecewise exponential regression estimated incidence rate ratios (IRRs) for hypertension, hyperlipidemia, diabetes, obesity, and ≥2 CVRFs by race/ethnicity. The CCSS sibling cohort and the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey cohort were used to compare the sociodemographic-adjusted IRRs for same-race/same-ethnicity disparities.ResultsNon-Hispanic Black (NHB) (n = 1,092) and Hispanic (n = 1,405) survivors compared with non-Hispanic White (NHW) (n = 13,960) survivors reported a higher cumulative incidence of diabetes (8.4%, 9.7%, and 5.1%, respectively); obesity (47.2%, 48.9%, and 30.2%, respectively); multiple CVRFs (17.7%, 16.6%, and 12.3%, respectively); and, for NHB survivors, hypertension (19.5%, 13.6%, and 14.3%, respectively) by 40 years of age (P < 0.001). Controlling for sociodemographic and treatment factors compared with NHW survivors, IRRs for NHB were increased for hypertension (IRR: 1.4; 95% CI: 1.1-1.8), obesity (IRR: 1.7; 95% CI: 1.4-2.1), and multiple CVRFs (IRR: 1.6; 95% CI: 1.2-2.1). IRRs for Hispanic survivors were increased for diabetes (IRR: 1.8; 95% CI: 1.2-2.6) and obesity (IRR: 1.4; 95% CI: 1.2-1.7). The pattern of IRRs for CVRF differences was similar among CCSS sibling and National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey cohorts.ConclusionsThe higher burden of CVRFs among NHB and Hispanic survivors compared with NHW survivors was similar to the general population. The promotion of cardiovascular health equity is critical in this high-risk population.

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Cancer prevalence among flight attendants compared to the general population.

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Cancer prevalence among flight attendants compared to the general population.

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