According to a statement released by lead author Rebecca Ghosh, of the National Heart and Lung Institute at Imperial College, ‘This study identified 18 occupations that are clearly linked with asthma risk, but there are others that did not show up in our analysis, mainly because they are relatively uncommon. Occupational asthma is widely under-recognised by employers, employees and healthcare professionals. Raising awareness that this is an almost entirely preventable disease would be a major step in reducing its incidence.’
For the study, which was published online first in the BMJ journal Thorax, the researchers used data from the National Child Development Study, which is tracking the long-term health of over 11,000 people in Britain. The data on nearly 9,500 participants born in 1958 was used, including asthma symptoms or wheezy bronchitis at ages 7, 11, 16, 33 and 42, and jobs and job histories at ages 33 and 42. 2,000 participants, who reported having symptoms before the age of 16, were left out of the analysis and the remaining sample were given allergen sensitivity and lung function tests between the ages of 42 and 45.
Of the 18 occupations that were clearly linked to adult onset asthma risk, four were cleaning jobs and another three were likely to expose workers to cleaning products. Farmers were also four times more likely to develop asthma in adulthood as office workers, and, in-line with previous studies, people who worked in hairdressing, and printing were also found to have increased risk.
However, when the researchers excluded self-reported data, only four occupations showed a significantly higher asthma risk: office and hotel cleaners, doorkeepers (an undefined term that may refer to security guards and bouncers), manufacturing labourers, and ‘hand packers’. The authors wrote, ‘Approximately 16% […] of adult onset asthma was associated with known asthmagenic occupational exposures,’ listing flour, enzymes, metals and textiles as well as cleaning products as among workplace materials linked to asthma risk.
Malayka Rahman, Research Analysis and Communications Officer at Asthma UK, urged, ‘We advise anyone who works in the industries highlighted in this study and who have experienced breathing problems to discuss this with their GP, and we urge healthcare professionals to make sure they consider possible occupational causes in adult onset asthma and tailor their advice to people with asthma accordingly.’