Our data confirm a high annual incidence of OA in this part of the UK. MWFs are an emerging problem, while isocyanates remain the commonest cause. Incidence remained at a fairly stable background level with many small and a few large epidemics superimposed. Schemes like Midland Thoracic Society's Rare Respiratory Disease Registry Surveillance Scheme of Occupational Asthma could help in identifying outbreaks by linking cases at the workplace.
We conducted a case-control study at three main inner-city hospitals in Birmingham, UK between 2004 and 2006, to determine the risk of adverse perinatal outcomes in pregnant women with tuberculosis (TB) (n = 24), compared with healthy pregnant controls (n = 72). The incidence of TB was 62/100,000 pregnancies, with 54.2% cases having pulmonary TB (41.7% extra-pulmonary; 4.2% both). Infants of mothers with TB had a significantly lower mean birth weight compared with controls (2,735 g vs 3,135 g; p = 0.03). Mean birth weight was lower in pulmonary TB than in the extra-pulmonary TB. Multivariate analysis showed that low birth weight was associated with pre-term delivery (p < 0.001). We conclude that pregnant women with TB are at higher risk of low birth weight due to higher odds of pre-term delivery.
Chromium salt and cobalt can be responsible for OA and OR in workers exposed to MWF aerosols. Onset of symptoms in those with positive specific challenges followed change in MWF brand. Workers with OA had increased urinary concentrations of chromium and cobalt, and those with OR had increased urinary concentrations of chromium.
Case-based e-learning on an international platform is a unique tool, which supports the quality improvement of education and training in OM throughout Europe in the longer term.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.