Mortality patterns among nickel/chromium alloy foundry workers.

All deaths between 1968 and 1979 from 26 foundries were studied to determine whether exposure to nickel/chromium resulted in an increased rate of any cause-specific mortality. The mortality experience of 851 foundrymen exposed to nickel/chromium was compared to that of 141 unexposed foundrymen. No nasal cancers were found. The exposed subgroup had a slightly lower proportion of cancer deaths, including lung cancer, and a slightly higher rate of nonmalignant respiratory disease deaths compared with the unexposed subgroup. Length of exposure was not significantly related to any of the selected cause-specific proportional mortality rates after adjusting for age, length of employment, and race. Standardized comparisons with the 1974 United States mortality patterns indicated that the total numbers of lung cancer and all cancer deaths were not significantly different from expected values for these exposed foundrymen, although there was an excess of lung cancer deaths among white males aged 65-99. These lung cancer rates followed an increasing trend with increasing length of foundry employment, although the trend was not statistically significant. However, this pattern does suggest that the excess of lung cancer deaths may be associated with length of foundry employment rather than exposure to nickel/chromium. There was a significant excess of respiratory system disease deaths among exposed workers associated with length of foundry employment, regardless of exposure to nickel/chromium. When all malignant and nonmalignant respiratory disease deaths are combined, there is no evidence of an increased risk associated with exposure to nickel/chromium.