Reliability of Reported Occupational History Information for US Coal Miners, 1969–1977

Details

• Personal Author:
  Attfield MD ; Brower PS
• Description:
  For estimating reliable exposure-response relations it is necessary that random variation in both the response and the exposure variables be sufficiently small. Variability in cumulative exposures can arise from uncertainties in self-reported work histories from interviews. In most Epidemiologic surveys, the information gathered from questionnaires is used without knowing the validity or reproducibility of these data. This paper investigates the reliability of occupational histories reported by the same individuals on two occasions separated by 9 years in the US National Study of Coal Workers' Pneumoconiosis and its implications on the exposure-response relation for simple coal workers' pneumoconiosis. For 480 coal miners, from whom occupational histories were obtained twice (in 1969-1971 and 1977-1981), the reliability (intraclass correlation coefficient) of the cumulative exposures generated from each work history was 87%. Logistic model fitting of simple coal workers' pneumoconiosis prevalence to the cumulative coal dust exposure produced almost identical results. After accounting for intersurvey variability in the occupational histories, the authors found that the exposure-response coefficients estimated from information reported at the surveys were attenuated by 12%. In epidemiologic studies, knowledge of the reproducibility of self- reported occupational history information is important to ascertain whether the true exposure effect is underestimated. [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Coal Coal Mining Dust Epidemiology Mining Occupational Exposure Occupational Health Respiratory Tract Diseases Safety Surveys And Questionnaires
• Keywords:
  Author Keywords: Occupational Exposure Coal-dust Coal-miners Coal-mining Coal-workers Dose-response Dust-exposure Dusts Mine-workers Miners Mining-industry Models Occupational-exposure Occupational-health Pneumoconiosis Pulmonary-system-disorders Questionnaires Reliability Statistical-analysis

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• ISSN:
  0002-9262
• Document Type:
  Text
• Genre:
  Journal Article
• Place as Subject:
  OSHA Region 3 ; West Virginia
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Division:
  DRDS - Division of Respiratory Disease Studies
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Volume:
  148
• Issue:
  9
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20000173
• Citation:
  Am J Epidemiol 1998 Nov; 148(9):920-926
• Contact Point Address:
  Patricia S. Brower, Epidemiological Investigations Branch, Division of Respiratory Disease Studies, MS-234, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, 1095 Willowdale Road, Morgantown, WV 26505-2888
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  1999
• Peer Reviewed:
  True
• Source Full Name:
  American Journal of Epidemiology
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:44046eb8199b6fce2cef6573fe246f4213226582030453b24867fdb8adfcba933d40247c0fee2c00ea4919bc54941a507c57a5835aad614ecab88a227fef0666
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/198174/cdc_198174_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 733.81 KB ]