Sister chromatid exchange in pathology staff occupationally exposed to formaldehyde

Genotoxic damage in pathology anatomy laboratory workers exposed to formaldehyde

“…SCE frequencies were higher in the FA-exposed subjects than in controls. These results agree with those presented by Shaham et al (1997Shaham et al ( , 2002 who described a significant increase of SCE frequency in peripheral lymphocytes of 90 pathology workers from 14 hospital pathology departments. The increase of SCE on FA exposed individuals was previously described by Yager et al (1986); SCE measured in the peripheral lymphocytes of eight non-smoking anatomy students after exposure to FA embalming solution during a 10 week anatomy class showed a significant increase (p = 0.02) when compared with samples obtained from the same individuals immediately before exposure began (breathing-zone samples showed a mean FA concentration of 1.2 ppm).…”

“…Keil et al (2001) reported that average daily area concentrations of airborne FA in a gross anatomy laboratory ranged from 0.635 to 1.82 mg/m 3 (0.51-1.46 ppm). Shaham et al (2002) reported for 14 pathology departments a mean low level and high level of FA exposure of 0.4 and 2.24 ppm, respectively. Ohmichi et al (2006) evaluated personal exposure levels and indoor FA concentrations in a gross anatomy laboratory during 3 sessions of a total 20 sessions over 10 weeks.…”

“…Inhaled FA primarily affects the upper airways; the severity and extent of physiological response depends on its concentration in the air. Several studies have consistently shown that the levels of airborne FA in anatomy laboratories exceed recommended exposure criteria (Shaham et al, 2002;Akbar-Khanzadeh and Pulido, 2003). Such results along with the recent implications of human carcinogenicity, point out for the need of close monitoring of FA exposures.…”

“…Several studies have shown the potential genotoxic effect of FA in proliferating cultured mammalian cell lines and in human lymphocytes. Induction of micronucleus (MN) (Suruda et al, 1993;He et al, 1998;Orsière et al, 2006), sister chromatid exchange (SCE) (He et al, 1998;Shaham et al, 1997Shaham et al, , 2002, chromosomal aberrations (CA) (He et al, 1998), DNA-protein crosslinks (DPC) (Shaham et al, 1996(Shaham et al, , 1997(Shaham et al, , 2003 and DNA damage (comet assay) (Yu et al, 2005) were reported in industrial workers, embalmers and pathology anatomists exposed to FA.…”

Determination of trace formaldehyde in blood plasma by resonance fluorescence technology

“…Inhaled formaldehyde undergoes chemical reactions with organic compounds, such as DNA and proteins, forming adducts and DNA-protein cross-links (DPC) [8][9][10], which may be one of the early indicators of the carcinogenesis process in formaldehyde-exposed workers. Epidemiological studies of industrial workers, embalmers and pathology anatomists have associated HCHO exposure with elevated risks for cancers at various sites, including nasal cavities, lung, brain, pancreas and lymphohematopoietic system [3,7,[11][12][13][14]. Based on available data the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classified HCHO as carcinogenic to humans (group 1) [15,16].…”