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Biomedical subjects

J S Mandel

Publications and source records attributed to J S Mandel.

At least 109 records · Page 6Linked to original sources
PubMed1988

Selection of elderly controls using random digit dialing.

The experience of identifying and soliciting elderly male controls, using a nonclustered random digit dialing procedure in a case-control study, is presented. For elderly controls (ages 65-84) 3.5 times more residential telephone numbers were required than for controls encompassing a much broader age range (ages 40-84). This is a function of the proportion of elderly in the population and their lower response to telephone identification. Elderly controls, age 70 and older, also had lower participation rates.

Aged↗
PubMed1988

Usefulness of comprehensive feasibility studies in environmental epidemiology investigations: a case study in Minnesota.

Episodes of public water supply contamination with industrial or agricultural chemicals frequently give rise to public concerns about adverse health effects. These concerns may precipitate epidemiologic or clinical investigations requiring large expenditures of state and federal resources regardless of whether such investigations are justified by scientific criteria. An alternative is a comprehensive feasibility study, utilizing all available information to determine whether large-scale studies are warranted or feasible. At a relatively modest cost, a feasibility study allows health officials to identify information needs and deficiencies, outline potential study options and costs, clearly establish the rationale for a proposed study or, conversely, prevent unwarranted expenditures of public resources. Furthermore, a feasibility study may in itself resolve many community and scientific concerns. This article provides a case study of the usefulness of a formal feasibility study in a situation involving an elevated cancer rate and contaminated municipal water supply wells surrounding a federal superfund site.

Costs and Cost Analysis↗
PubMed1987

Sexual factors and prostatic cancer: results from a case-control study.

A case-control study of a number of factors of possible etiologic significance for prostatic cancer was conducted in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. The focus was primarily on sexual factors. Two hundred and fifty incident cases of prostatic cancer, 238 hospital controls, and 240 neighborhood controls were included. Controls were matched to cases on age, sex, and race. Cases were somewhat more educated than controls. An association was found between prostatic cancer and a history of venereal disease in their sexual partners: odds ratio (OR) = 2.71, 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.14 to 6.46 and OR = 2.09, 95% CI = 1.02 to 4.29 for hospital and neighborhood controls, respectively. Cases had more sexual experiences with prostitutes, although their overall lifetime frequency of sexual intercourse with all partners was somewhat lower. Cases also reported more homosexual partners than controls. The results from the study lend some support to an infectious hypothesis for prostatic cancer. The lower frequency of sexual intercourse (OR = .54, 95% CI = .34 to .83 and OR = .68, 95% CI = .47 to 1.01 for hospital and neighborhood controls, respectively) is also noteworthy and may be indicative of a hormonal difference related to sexual interest or drive.

Adult↗
PubMed1985

Problems in the use of dead controls in case-control studies. I. General results.

A recently completed case-control study in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area using population-based living controls and dead controls afforded the opportunity to compare these two control groups on their exposure histories. Detailed information was obtained by interview from 697 living controls and the next of kin of 493 dead controls. The dead controls of both sexes were reported to have been significantly heavier cigarette smokers compared with living controls, as well as heavier consumers of hard liquor, beer, and drugs, and to have had more adulthood diseases. There were no consistent differences between the control groups for consumption of nonalcoholic beverages, some aspects of diet, ethnic and religious background, usual occupation, and residential history. It appears that exposures associated with premature death are overrepresented in dead controls compared with living controls, while those variables not associated with premature mortality are distributed more or less similarly between the two groups.

Adult↗
PubMed1985

Problems in the use of dead controls in case-control studies. II. Effect of excluding certain causes of death.

A recent comparison of 493 dead and 697 living controls from a case-control study of cancer in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area showed that the dead controls of both sexes were reported to have been significantly heavier consumers of cigarettes, hard liquor, beer, and certain drugs, and to have had more adulthood diseases than living controls. The present analysis examines the effect of excluding causes of death associated with those exposures found in excess in the dead controls. Exclusion of individuals with smoking-related causes of death reduced but did not eliminate the excess of cigarette smokers among the dead controls. Deletion of individuals with alcohol-related causes of death only slightly reduced the excess among dead controls. Adjustment for cigarette smoking, however, nearly eliminated the association with alcohol consumption, particularly among males. For certain adulthood diseases and medications, the exclusion of individuals with exposure-associated causes of death also virtually eliminated the excesses found in the dead controls when compared with the living controls. Thus, it appears that even after extensive exclusion of smoking-related causes of death, the association between dead controls and cigarette smoking still remains, and the use of dead controls in case-control studies where cigarette smoking is the risk factor being evaluated may lead to a biased underestimated of risk. For the other exposures found in significant excess among the dead controls, the exclusion of exposure-related causes of death and proper adjustment for confounders may eliminate much or all of the excess.

Adult↗
PubMed1985

A retrospective cohort mortality study of iron ore (hematite) miners in Minnesota.

In a retrospective cohort mortality study of 10,403 Minnesota iron-ore (hematite) miners no excesses of lung cancer mortality were found among either underground (Standardized mortality ratio [SMR] = 100) or above ground (SMR = 88) miners. Yugoslav-born miners incurred a two-fold significant excess mortality for lung cancer that did not appear to be associated with their mining exposures. Significant excesses in mortality due to stomach cancer were found for both underground (SMR = 167) and aboveground (SMR = 181) miners as compared with U.S. white males. However, except among Finnish-born miners, these excesses disappeared when comparisons were made with the appropriate county rate. The apparent absence of significant radon exposure, a strict smoking prohibition underground, an aggressive silicosis control program, and the absence of underground diesel fuel use may explain why these underground miners did not appear to incur the lung cancer risk reported in other studies.

Aged↗
PubMed1984

A population--based case--control study of renal cell carcinoma.

A population-based case-control study of renal cell carcinoma (495 cases and 697 controls) in the Minneapolis-St. Paul seven-county metropolitan area implicated cigarette smoking as a risk factor with an odds ratio (OR) among men of 1.6 (95% confidence intervals: 1.1-2.4) and among women of 1.9 (1.3-3.0). A statistically significant dose response was observed in both sexes for pack-years of cigarette use. On the basis of calculations of attributable risk, it was estimated that 30% of renal cell cancers among men and 24% among women were due to smoking. High relative adult weight as measured by the body mass index (BMI) was found to be a major risk factor among women but not among men, with those in the highest 5% of the BMI having an OR of 5.9 (1.8-20.4) in comparison to the lowest quartile. This association with excess weight was not seen at age 20, but it became more pronounced with increasing age, suggesting that the primary influence of weight gain is during the late stages of renal carcinogenesis. Excess risks were also related to ethnic background (particularly, German), which may account in part for the elevated incidence of renal cancer in the North Central area of the United States. In addition, positive associations were observed for long-term use of phenacetin-containing analgesics, heavy meat consumption, and heavy tea drinking (females only). An occupational clue was provided by an increased risk for exposure to petroleum, tar, and pitch products. Excesses of certain urologic and cardiovascular diseases were also observed among the cases compared to controls.

Adenocarcinoma↗
PubMed1983

Etiology of cancer of the renal pelvis.

A population-based case--control interview study of cancer of the renal pelvis (74 cases and 697 controls) conducted in the Minneapolis--St. Paul metropolitan area showed cigarette smoking to be the major cause of this cancer. The odds ratio (OR) for cigarette smoking was 7.6 among males [95% confidence interval (CI): 2.2-31.5] and 5.8 among females (95% CI: 2.0-17.3), with the OR exceeding 10 for heavy smokers of both sexes. Long-term use of analgesics and several occupational exposures were also found to be risk factors. In addition, there were unexpected positive associations among females for heavy tea consumption and for use of estrogen medications, although the significance of these relationships remains to be clarified.

Adult↗
PubMed1982

Tri-state toxic-state syndrome study. I. Epidemiologic findings.

Eighty women who had onset of toxic-shock syndrome (TSS) between October 1, 1979, and September 19, 1980, and 160 age- and sex-matched neighborhood controls participated in this study to evaluate risk factors associated with TSS in women. Of the 80 women, 76 had onset of illness during their menstrual periods. The odds ratio for developing menses-associated TSS with any use of tampons compared with no use of tampons was 18.01 (P less than 0.001). The odds ratios ranged from 5.29 to 27.5 for individual brand use compared with no use. When exclusive use of a particular tampon brand was compared with exclusive use of all other brands. Rely (Procter and Gamble, Cincinnati, Ohio) was the only brand with a significantly increased odds ratio (2.49; P = 0.005). By multiple logistic regression analysis, the risk of TSS was more closely associated with tampon fluid capacity (absorbency) than with the use of all tampon brands.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1980

The Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome in the United States and Canada (1892-1979).

Information was collected on 301 cases of the Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome in the United States and Canada Examination of available medical records, death certificates and published case reports on these patients showed that they came from a wide geographic area and many diverse ethnic and racial groups. No significant difference was found in the incidence of cases born between 1947 and 1976; the overall rate was 4.0 per million live male births in the United States. Median survival has increased with time from eight months for patients born before 1935 to 6.5 years for those born after 1964. Seventy-six of the 301 patients (25%) were still alive at last follow-up and ranged in age from 1 to 36 years with a median of 10 years. Causes of death were primarily limited to infections or bleeding, but malignancy represented a significant problem. Twelve percent of the group (36 of 301) developed malignancy, the predominant types being lymphorecticular tumors (23 of 36) and leukemia (7 of 36). The overall relative risk for malignancy was found to be greater than 100 times that of the general population and was found to increase with increasing age.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1977

Incidence of skin carcinoma after renal transplantation.

The development of de novo malignant neoplasms after renal transplantation continues to be of importance. The incidence of skin cancer in the renal transplant population at the University of Minnesota Hospital is compared with that expected on the basis of rates from the special nonmelanoma part of the Third National Cancer Survey. Overall, the risk of skin cancer in the renal transplant population was 7.1 times that expected. This excess was due primarily to squamous cell carcinomas, which were 36.4 times as frequent as expected.

Adult↗
PubMed1975

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in two cities of contrasting air quality.

Spirometric tests of 3280 Ottawa residents in 1969-71 and 2208 Sudbury residents in 1972-73 showed that the mean ratio of forced vital capacity to forced expiratory volume in 1 second was lower in Sudbury, where sulfur dioxide concentrations in the air tend to be appreciably higher than in Ottawa. This difference was significant for both males and females considered separately, and held true when age and smoking habits were taken into account. The prevalence of symptomatic chronic bronchitis was significantly higher in Sudbury males than in Ottawa males, but no such difference could be detected in females.

Adolescent↗