Acquavella J F, Douglass T S, Phillips S C
Exxon Biomedical Sciences, Inc, East Millstone, NJ 08875-2350.
J Occup Med. 1988 May;30(5):438-42. doi: 10.1097/00043764-198805000-00012.
In response to reports of an unusually high number of colorectal cancers among employees on a unit devoted to the manufacture of polypropylene, we examined colorectal cancer incidence rates for 335 workers with at least 6 months employment on this unit from 1960 to 1985. Assuming a 10-year latent period, we found a significant 5.6-fold colorectal cancer excess (7 observed/1.26 expected, standardized incidence ratio (SIR) = 5.6, 95% confidence interval (CI) 2.2 to 11.5), concentrated among mechanical (5 observed/0.47 expected, SIR = 10.6, 95% CI 3.4 to 24.7) and process workers (2 observed/0.40 expected, SIR = 5.0, 95% CI 0.6 to 17.8). No colorectal cancer was found among administrative/office personnel on our study roster. All of the cancers occurred in employees who initially worked on the unit during its first 6 years of operation, and the minimum interval from start of employment to cancer development was 20 years. In addition, the ages of the cancer cases suggested a younger age distribution than would be expected based on general population rates. Since this study was descriptive in nature, we could not evaluate whether the cancer excess was related to occupational exposures, other environmental factors, or the random clustering of cancers in our worker populations (viz, "chance"). Further studies are currently ongoing to assess occupational and/or personal factors that may be related to this colorectal cancer excess.
针对有关聚丙烯生产部门员工中结直肠癌病例数量异常高的报告，我们调查了1960年至1985年期间在该部门工作至少6个月的335名工人的结直肠癌发病率。假设潜伏期为10年，我们发现结直肠癌的发病率显著高出5.6倍（观察到7例/预期1.26例，标准化发病比（SIR）=5.6，95%置信区间（CI）2.2至11.5），主要集中在机械工人（观察到5例/预期0.47例，SIR = 10.6，95%CI 3.4至24.7）和生产工人（观察到2例/预期0.40例，SIR = 5.0，95%CI 0.6至17.8）中。在我们研究名单上的行政/办公室人员中未发现结直肠癌病例。所有癌症病例均发生在该部门运营的前6年期间最初就在该部门工作的员工中，从开始工作到患癌的最短间隔为20年。此外，癌症病例的年龄分布显示，相较于基于一般人群发病率预期的年龄分布，该部门员工的患癌年龄更小。由于本研究本质上是描述性的，我们无法评估癌症发病率过高是否与职业暴露、其他环境因素或我们所研究工人群体中癌症的随机聚集（即“偶然性”）有关。目前正在进行进一步研究，以评估可能与这种结直肠癌发病率过高相关的职业和/或个人因素。
