Lifestyle of UK Commercial Aircrews Relative to Air Traffic Controllers and the General Population

Pizzi, Costanza; Evans, Sally; Stavola, Bianca De; Evans, Anthony; Clemens, Felicity; dos‐Santos‐Silva, Isabel

doi:10.3357/asem.2315.2008

Cited by 19 publications

(21 citation statements)

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“…However, such comparison may hide increases in specific site-specific cancer risks experienced by this occupational group. To be able to identify such increases, if present, we took UK ATCOs, which have a similar socioeconomic background and type of medical surveillance as flight crew, 13 as a comparison group. We found that flight crew had similar cancer risks to ATCOs, arguing against their risks being driven mainly by occupation-specific exposures.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The study design and data sources have been described in detail elsewhere. [13][14][15] In summary, the study population was identified from the Medical Records System (MRS) of the UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), which holds data gathered from routine surveillance examinations of holders of UK licences, that is, holders of a UK professional flight crew licence or ATCO licence. Flight crew licences comprise licenses for airline transport pilot (ATPL), senior commercial pilot, commercial pilot, basic commercial pilot, flight engineer and flight navigator.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Cancer incidence in professional flight crew and air traffic control officers: Disentangling the effect of occupational versus lifestyle exposures

dos‐Santos‐Silva

Stavola

Pizzi

et al. 2012

Intl Journal of Cancer

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Flight crew are occupationally exposed to several potentially carcinogenic hazards; however, previous investigations have been hampered by lack of information on lifestyle exposures. The authors identified, through the United Kingdom Civil Aviation Authority medical records, a cohort of 16,329 flight crew and 3,165 air traffic control officers (ATCOs) and assembled data on their occupational and lifestyle exposures. Standardised incidence ratios (SIRs) were estimated to compare cancer incidence in each occupation to that of the general population; internal analyses were conducted by fitting Cox regression models. Allcancer incidence was 20-29% lower in each occupation than in the general population, mainly due to a lower incidence of smoking-related cancers [SIR (95% CI) 5 0.33 (0.27-0.38) and 0.42 (0.28-0.60) for flight crew and ATCOs, respectively], consistent with their much lower prevalence of smoking. Skin melanoma rates were increased in both flight crew (SIR 5 1.87; 95% CI 5 1.45-2.38) and ATCOs (2.66; 1.55-4.25), with rates among the former increasing with increasing number of flight hours (p-trend 5 0.02). However, internal analyses revealed no differences in skin melanoma rates between flight crew and ATCOs (hazard ratio: 0.78, 95% CI 5 0.37-1.66) and identified skin that burns easily when exposed to sunlight (p 5 0.001) and sunbathing to get a tan (p 5 0.07) as the strongest risk predictors of skin melanoma in both occupations. The similar sitespecific cancer risks between the two occupational groups argue against risks among flight crew being driven by occupationspecific exposures. The skin melanoma excess reflects sun-related behaviour rather than cosmic radiation exposure.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cancer incidence in professional flight crew and air traffic control officers: Disentangling the effect of occupational versus lifestyle exposures

dos‐Santos‐Silva

Stavola

Pizzi

et al. 2012

Intl Journal of Cancer

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“…An unexposed control population with otherwise similar lifestyle was not recruited at the inception of the cohort. Newer studies suggest that air traffic controllers might be a suitable comparison group [28,31]. Furthermore, the computed occupational doses do not take into account work periods at airlines other than the two airlines used to compile the cohort, and may thus have been underestimated.…”

Section: Strengths and Limitationsmentioning

confidence: 95%

Cosmic radiation and mortality from cancer among male German airline pilots: extended cohort follow-up

et al. 2012

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Commercial airline pilots are exposed to cosmic radiation and other specific occupational factors, potentially leading to increased cancer mortality. This was analysed in a cohort of 6,000 German cockpit crew members. A mortality follow-up for the years 1960-2004 was performed and occupational and dosimetry data were collected for this period. 405 deaths, including 127 cancer deaths, occurred in the cohort. The mortality from all causes and all cancers was significantly lower than in the German population. Total mortality decreased with increasing radiation doses (rate ratio (RR) per 10 mSv: 0.85, 95 % CI: 0.79, 0.93), contrasting with a non-significant increase of cancer mortality (RR per 10 mSv: 1.05, 95 % CI: 0.91, 1.20), which was restricted to the group of cancers not categorized as radiogenic in categorical analyses. While the total and cancer mortality of cockpit crew is low, a positive trend of all cancer with radiation dose is observed. Incomplete adjustment for age, other exposures correlated with duration of employment and a healthy worker survivor effect may contribute to this finding. More information is expected from a pooled analysis of updated international aircrew studies.

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“…There is probably a low prevalence of smoking in this cohort since they had a low lung cancer incidence (24,25); a low smoking prevalence was found in other flying cohorts (32,33). This tends to reduce the AMI incidence.…”

Section: Linnersjö Et Almentioning

confidence: 99%

Low mortality and myocardial infarction incidence among flying personnel during working career and beyond

Linnersjö

Brodin²,

Andersson³

et al. 2010

Scand J Work Environ Health

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Lifestyle of UK Commercial Aircrews Relative to Air Traffic Controllers and the General Population

Cited by 19 publications

References 0 publications

Cancer incidence in professional flight crew and air traffic control officers: Disentangling the effect of occupational versus lifestyle exposures

Cancer incidence in professional flight crew and air traffic control officers: Disentangling the effect of occupational versus lifestyle exposures

Cosmic radiation and mortality from cancer among male German airline pilots: extended cohort follow-up

Low mortality and myocardial infarction incidence among flying personnel during working career and beyond

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