Incidence of XXXX among welders, platers, machinists, and pipe fitters in shipyards and machine shops.

@entity1 @entity263 @entity6596 @entity5 @entity2 @entity2615
The incidence of @entity5 in 12,693 shipyard and machine shop male workers (1689 welders, 4308 platers, 6003 machinists, 693 pipe fitters) employed for at least one year between 1945 and 1960 was investigated in a retrospective cohort study. The welders had welded only mild steel and had not been exposed to @entity6596 containing fume. The follow up was 99.7% complete and the total number of @entity1 -years was 304,682. The incidence of @entity5 in 1953-81 was ascertained through the Finnish @entity5 Registry. The observed numbers of cases of @entity5 were compared with the expected numbers based on regional urban rates. The smoking habits of the cohort were surveyed with a postal questionnaire sent to a sample of 961 workers. The smoking habits of the cohorts were similar and smoking was not more common than among the general population. The total number of cases of @entity5 was 611 (exp 629) among the shipyard workers and 376 (exp 388) among the machine shop workers. The incidence of @entity2 was increased among the shipyard workers (obs 227, exp 192). This excess was observed in all the worker groups and was most evident for the pipe fitters and platers. Among the machine shop workers, the incidence of @entity2 was lower than expected with the exception of the welders who had a slightly raised risk of @entity2 (obs 14, exp 10). The incidence of @entity5 was slightly raised among the shipyard workers (obs 24, exp 20) but not in the machine shop workers. No excess risk was observed among the welders. The incidence of @entity263 was increased among the machine shop workers (obs 39, exp 31) but not in the shipyard workers. The excess was statistically significant for the welders. No pronounced excess could be found for other types of @entity5 . Analysis by the duration or exposure showed that the @entity2 in the shipyard workers was most evident during the last period of observation (1972-81). No other trends were obvious and the slight @entity2 observed among the welders did not increase with increasing follow up time. No excess risk for @entity2615 was found. The small @entity2 in welders could be due to chance. The fact that only a small and statistically insignificant @entity2 could be found among this group of heavily exposed welders suggest that if the risk of @entity2 was associated with welding this risk must nowadays be low and probably too low to be unequivocally detected in most epidemiological studies.
