Using ELISAs, we determined the concentrations of transforming growth factor alpha (TGF-alpha), the extracellular domain of the erbB-2 receptor (erbB-2 ECD), and mutant p53 protein in stored serum samples of asbestosis patients with and without cancer and control subjects (without asbestosis or cancer). The percentage of individuals in these three groups with increased serum concentrations of T...

We analyzed the limitations of the International Labor Organization (ILO) classification of chest roentgenograms in predicting the presence of histologically determined early asbestosis. The ILO system is arbitrary, without histologic correlates, and does not consider the asbestos exposure history or clinical and laboratory information. We present data from the literature and our own work which...

OBJECTIVE To assess the evidence for the hypothesis that lung cancer has a predilection for the lower lobes in workers with asbestosis. METHOD A review of the available literature with relevant information. RESULTS Six published reports were analysed. In four studies limited to series of cases with diagnoses of asbestosis, three showed lower lobe predominance of lung cancer whereas the four...

24 Years of Pneumoconiosis Mortality Surveillance in Australia: Derek R. SMITH, et al. International Center for Research Promotion and Informatics, National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health—Asbestosis, silicosis and Coal Worker’s Pneumoconiosis (CWP) represent three of the most important occupationally-related dust diseases in Australia. To gain a clear picture of pneumoconiosis tren...

Lung cancer originates most commonly in the upper lobes in the general population but among workers with asbestosis it is most common in the lower lobes. Published data on lobar distribution were used to estimate the probabilities that lung cancer among asbestos workers is attributable to exposure to asbestos. This attribution varies directly with the relative risk. Critical values of the relat...

Asbestos is a mineral-mined form the rocks, consisting in amosite (brown asbestos), crocidolite (blue asbestos) and÷or chrysotile (white asbestos) used in many industries. Researches about the exposure to asbestos dust and asbestosis related diseases started almost a century ago. The first case report of fatal asbestosis disease was published in 1906, in England, by Dr. Hubert Montague Murray. ...

Asbestos is the name given to a series of minerals composed of fibrous silicates of magnesium and iron which find widespread use in industry. Inhalation of the dust may cause asbestosis, a crippling form of pulmonary fibrosis, which usually does not appear until many years after the initial exposure. There is also an increased incidence of carcinoma of the lung in patients with asbestosis, and ...

This review examines the hypothesis that excess lung cancer risk in worker cohorts exposed to asbestos occurs only among those with asbestosis. The adequately designed studies in the literature support this hypothesis. The summary relative risk for lung cancer was 1.00 in seven cohorts with no deaths from asbestosis. In addition, there is a high correlation between asbestosis rates and lung can...

difficulty. First, since asbestosis is a dose-related disease and workplace asbestos exposures have decreased over the last several decades, past occurrence data for asbestosis do not apply to present cohorts.1 Second, the clinical diagnosis of asbestosis encompasses criteria of variable specificity.2 Therefore, the frequency of diagnosing asbestosis varies inversely with the degree of specific...

A group of 339 male shipyard workers responded to an invitation via shipyards, unions, and news media to be studied for the presence of asbestosis and its functional effects. Of these, 288 were white or black, had begun working in shipyards at least 20 years earlier, and had satisfactory chest x-ray film findings; 257 underwent spirometric testing, and 199 had single-breath diffusing capacities...