Night Work and the Risk of Cancer Among Men - Essay Example

Night Work and the Risk of Cancer among Men Night Work and the Risk of Cancer among Men The objectives of the study were to find out how night work influenced the risk of cancer through the suppression of melatonin release. It studied men who worked at night and their likelihood of being diagnosed with cancer due to light exposure. The association of interest was men who held night-shift duties such as watchmen, m mechanics, bakers, drivers, mechanics, machine operators, security guards, maintenance workers, boiler room operators, railway workers, firemen, policemen, waiters, cooks, hospital workers, dockworkers, and bakers.

The study targeted men aged between 35-70 years residing in the greater Montreal who had been diagnosed with incident, pathologically confirmed cancer at any major 18 hospitals of Montreal. The study results confirmed earlier studies which had linked night shift workers to increased levels of cancer. However, the study also provided new evidence that had not been well investigated previously, which was the relationship between night work and risks of several types of cancer among men. The results suggested increased risks of cancer sites among men working at night.

The results were not tested, since the researchers point out that, “the absence of duration-response relations, and the very fact of ostensible excess risks across such a wide array of tumour types, might raise questions about the credibility of these findings and possible methodological artefacts” (Parent, 2012, p. 753).The primary risk of exposure of interest was the relationship between night work and the risk of cancer among men. The study found that there was the existence of a relationship between cancer and night work, although it was not accurately measured.

A case study was used to conduct this study of night work and the risk of cancer among men. It involved interviewing men who resided in greater Montreal and who had been diagnosed with various types of cancer in the 18 hospitals in Montreal. The study only focused on male patients who had visited the largest hospitals in Montreal between 1979 and 1985. Out of 4,576 eligible cancer patients 82% of the patients, which total to 3, 730 were successfully interviewed. 81% responded for themselves while the remaining per cent, their spouses acted as the respondents.

The study only focused on men who had visited hospitals and successfully been diagnosed with various types of cancer. The selection bias was based on the exposure of interest. The fact that only those men who had been diagnosed with cancer were selected for the study made it qualify for selection of interest. If other factors had been put into the question, the outcome could have substantially differed with this outcome. The study focused on a particular point of interest, which did not produce any substantial bias.

The subject assignment to exposure to the disease was not accurate. The study basically linked the various types of cancer affecting patients to their night work, but did not test the outcome. It was generally by observation, not scientific testing was done on the various categories of diseases. The mis-assignments were possible for all the groups. Lack of concrete scientific evidence to link the various disease categories raised a substantial bias. To minimize the influence of external factors before the analysis of the data, the study restricted the subjects under study.

Respondents were only residents of larger Montreal, who had been diagnosed with cancer in the 18 hospitals, who were only men, aged between 35-70 years. The researchers ensured that only diagnosed respondents were interviewed by the study to control confounding bias. The fact that only the identified respondents or their spouses were respondents was a control measure for the study. The measure of association reported in the study was that of a relationship between night-shift duties and the various types of cancer among men.

The stability of the measure reported by the study was highly stable since there was a direct relationship between the night-shift work and cancer cases among men. The major result of the study linked the various types of cancer among men to night work. The interpretation of the results had a significant effect on the earlier studies, which had suggested that there was a relationship between night work and cancer among men. The results of the study were the same and the misclassification was nondifferential.

The interpretation of the study showed levels of exposure among the respondents under study. There was substantial evidence linking some of the cancer types to night-duty, although timing of exposure did not affect the risk of exposure. The results of the study may be generalized to a larger population of cancer patterns among men, and the various occupations that they are involved in. The conclusion indicated that the methodological bias was apparent in the study, and thus discussed the limitations of the study adequately.

The final conclusion was a balance of the summary of the findings from the study. ReferenceParent, M., El-Zein, M., Rousseau, M., Pintos, J., & Siemiatycki, J. (2012). Night Work and the Risk of Cancer among Men. American journal of epidemiology,176, 9.