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Occupational rhinitis and occupational asthma: Association or progression?
Author(s) -
Balogun Rahmat A.,
Siracusa Andrea,
Shusterman Dennis
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
american journal of industrial medicine
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.7
H-Index - 104
eISSN - 1097-0274
pISSN - 0271-3586
DOI - 10.1002/ajim.22819
Subject(s) - medicine , occupational asthma , asthma , occupational disease , occupational medicine , occupational exposure , occupational safety and health , incidence (geometry) , occupational lung disease , environmental health , pathology , physics , optics
Background Occupational asthma is the most frequently reported occupational respiratory disease in registries, and is often co‐diagnosed with occupational rhinitis. We undertook a systematic review of the English‐language epidemiologic literature linking these two conditions, with emphasis on progression from occupational rhinitis to occupational asthma. Methods PubMed and Embase were queried in a series of structured searches designed to identify studies comparing occupational asthma and occupational rhinitis incidence or prevalence in occupationally exposed individuals. Results The searches yielded a total of 109 unique citations, 15 of which yielded inferential data on the occupational rhinitis‐asthma relationship. Nine of fifteen studies showed statistically significant associations between the occurrence of occupational rhinitis and occupational asthma among individual workers. Conclusions Limited data support the notion that occupational rhinitis precedes the development of occupational asthma, particularly when high‐molecular‐weight (HMW) agents are involved. The relationship between the two conditions could not be evaluated in many relevant studies due to a lack of cross‐tabulation of individual cases.