Australian research and studies have confirmed their initial findings that the risk of developing mesothelioma will continue to be on the rise even a few more decades after a worker’s first exposure to asbestos.
One of the first studies of this kind conducted by the Curtin University in partnership with the UWA School of Public Health assessed and evaluated on 22,048 people regularly exposed to asbestos worldwide using information from six other similar studies of exposed Australian workers and two other residential exposures.
Peritoneal and pleural mesothelioma are both cancers that are attributed to an abnormal development on the lining of the lungs and are generally caused by a person’s exposure to asbestos.
Researchers have used conditional logistic regression as a representation of the relationship between a person’s initial exposure to asbestos and the possible risk of pleural mesothelioma as well as the rare occurrence of peritoneal mesothelioma.
The abovementioned study determined that the rate and the risk of pleural mesothelioma are increased even until 45 years after a worker’s first exposure to asbestos. Up until the 45-year peak, the risk will eventually slow down.
In the case of the peritoneal mesothelioma, its rate of risk continues to rise over a span of 10 to 50 years.
Alison Reid, associate professor of Curtin University and lead author of the said research, confirms the significance of the study as it aims for the thorough examination of the long-term effects of exposure to asbestos as well as a more detailed enumeration of the other hazards of asbestos.
Reid further expressed her concern over the fact that there has only been a few studies on the mesothelioma, particularly its long-term risks, which she attributes to most similar other studies not having the necessary programs focused on following up on the progress of these studies over long periods of time. She believes this is the root cause for not having that possibility to have enough information to evaluate on the long-term risks so far.
Reid added that the risk of mesothelioma does not seem to appear to decline over the course of some few years and as such stresses the necessity of having to prevent people from being exposed to asbestos.
On Patients and Their Employment Records
Professor and author Reid mentioned that selected cohort studies had been established many years back based on the employment records from the different companies that affected workers have worked for previously.
Reid confirmed that in a span of many decades the workers were matched with cancer and death registries in the Australian as well as Italian regions. To cite, the Wittenoom workers were at some point previously employed by the Australian Blue Asbestos company during its mine and mill operation of the blue asbestos at the Wittenoom region between the years 1943 and 1966.
Reid was not exactly sure what they would exactly find with the study but was surprised to discover that the risk of developing peritoneal mesothelioma did not slow any decrease ever over the long span of time.
Reid concluded that when the cohort studies were examined separately, some of the research suggested that while the risk of pleural mesothelioma gives a promising decline around about 40 years, there still has a lot more cases to examine a
