Asbestosis and Mesothelioma Medical Records Ignored by Nation Leaders
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Medical records that pertain to asbestosis or mesothelioma must be dug up from the archives of the past. Without medical record collections and retrievals, the forewarnings of impending asbestosis and mesothelioma come only from witnessing the sufferings of an asbestosis patient or the languishing death of a mesothelioma cancer patient.
Asbestosis and mesothelioma statistics are sharply under-estimated due to the lack of many nations to implement an efficient medical retrieval system and properly care for and diagnose lung disease patients who are suffering from asbestosis or mesothelioma due to asbestos exposure. In many nations, physicians that are able to properly diagnose the disease are rarely, if ever, available. These same nations often have poor record keeping systems in place to monitor health trends and examine medical histories. Many times asbestosis and mesothelioma are simply referenced as “lung disease,” without a proper determination of the classification of lung disease.
Years pass before these progressive lung diseases start showing their scarring presence, but an archive of medical history can facilitate proper diagnosis, and national archives of medical histories can facilitate early warnings. Despite this knowledge, India has no cancer registry, nor does it have a system for recording mesothelioma and asbestosis cases. In the Philippines, the Occupational Safety and Health Center (OSHC) reports that asbestos caused diseases will be under diagnosed due to low employer participation in submitting medical records to a central agency. (Less than 5% of employers do so.)
In Brazil, where corporations scurry to cover any implications of occupational hazards or ill will, medical records are virtually non-existent for asbestos workers. The Eternit asbestos plant in Brazil has had asbestos workers for over 50 years, yet no medical records were ever kept prior to 1978. In China, death records are purged and permanently eliminated after death, leaving no source for documenting trends in deaths or comparisons and similarities between diseases. And although China is one of the top five asbestos producers and users in the world, this nation continues to have a minimal amount of empirical studies on the implications of asbestos exposure.
Fortunately, in many nations, allowable exposure limits are being reduced, inspections are being heightened, and politicians and corporations are being pressured. Environmental groups and protection agencies continue to test asbestos material and promote its eventual ban. Unfortunately, politics and corporations still govern irresponsible asbestos promotions, and millions of innocent people are unaware of its dangers. The lack of public awareness has led to a deadly economic dependency on asbestos.
Asbestosis and mesothelioma deaths need to be recorded, death records need to be maintained, and medical histories of asbestos workers need to be compiled to gain a full realization of the statistical and economical impact of the world’s burgeoning asbestosis and mesothelioma crisis. Asbestosis and mesothelioma records are useless, however, unless they are used to promote change and develop public awareness – which is precisely what the mining and trading nations are afraid of.
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Help answer the question
How frequently does asbestosis develop into diseases such as lung cancer or mesothelioma?
asbestosis
9 Comments
August 23rd, 2009 at 5:11 pm
August 23rd, 2009 at 5:18 pm
No. Some fibres can remain in the lung forever and cause no issues. It is when the body defends against the fibres and enclose them in protein substances and create "asbestosis bodies", that a chronic inflammation occurs. this is asbestosis.
August 23rd, 2009 at 10:00 pm
This would depend on the severity of the asbestosis, i.e. some sufferers can have a mild widespread scarring of the lungs over a life time. However smokers who continue smoking after they have been diagnosed with asbestosis have a fifty five percent higher chance of developing cancer and mesothelioma – particularly if the person smokes more than 20 per day.
Tobacco smoke and asbestos both contribute to each other’s cancer-causing carcinogenic effects, hence, both risk factors combined is more dangerous than the effects of one risk factor alone.
August 23rd, 2009 at 10:59 pm
Hi, sorry but i don't know where you're from so I can't help you find a naturopathic dr. Sorry! But this link might be of interest to you
http://www.blackmores.com.au/news/news_detail.asp?art=989
Good Luck
August 24th, 2009 at 7:16 am
August 24th, 2009 at 8:27 pm
Asbestosis is not nescessarily fatal, but can decrease lung capacity and lead to heart failure. It causes chronic scarring in the plueral walls and can actually lead to mesothelioma. Mesothelioma, on the other hand is a rare form of cancer caused by prlonged expsosure to asbestos. This cancer is highly resistant to conventional radiotherapy and chemo drugs, and very often has a poor survival rate.
August 25th, 2009 at 4:56 pm
August 26th, 2009 at 2:55 pm
Hopefully, Spreedog answers this Q
. Maybe he (or, someone else) will have a much better answer. But, I’ll give this a shot…
I found a 1997, where cohorts of asbestos sprayers and silicosis patients were tracked for incidence of cancer. Total cancer, lung cancer, and mesothelioma were dependent/criterion variables (<-not familiar with the statistics utilized), from what I saw. I realize this research is a little dated. There is no control group, but just looks like a report on incidence, but, still, not very much control to attribute results to isolated effects. Anyway, from what I read, standardized incidence ratios indicated that asbestos sprayers had a significantly higher incidence in the development of mesothelioma. Silicosis patients only had significantly higher incidence ratios for all sites (i.e., total cancer risk). Check out the abstract for yourself:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9131223?ordinalpos=2&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_DefaultReportPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum
Interesting little bits to do with silicosis and asbestos-related diseases. More recent, but not quite relevant to your Q: Apparently, silicosis and asbestos-related diseases not only differ in their causative materials (obviously, really), but also in terms of complications; autoimmune disorders being common in silicosis and tumors in asbestos-related diseases. Asbestos-related disease patients also show restricted overpresentation of TcR-Vbeta without clonal expansion, whereas silicosis patients reveal significant overpresentation of TcR-Vbeta 7.2. Basically, it may be concluded, here, that there are superantigenic effects associated with asbestos and dysregulation of autoimmunity-inducing effects of silica. I include these aforementioned bits, for the sake of interest, really, but perhaps you may glean something related to your reasoning/background to do with asking the Q. Here is the relevant abstract:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17166401?ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_DefaultReportPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum
EDIT: Below, scroll down to the graph entitled, "CDC asbestosis vs silicosis deaths" associated with "Attachment 1". It's not a very clear graph. Pesky. But, on quick skim, it looks like a comparison of those with either asbestosis or silicosis who expired due to malignant mesothelioma, from 1980 thru 2002. Looks like, asbestosis on the rise and a bigger killer (?):
http://www.actuary.org/pdf/casualty/asbestos_feb06.pdf
August 26th, 2009 at 7:23 pm
They will give you an x ray, but that is not the final answer as to if you have asbestosis. They will do Pulmonary function tests, Ct Scan and even do a Bronchoscopy, where they run a tube down and actually take out a piece of the lung to check for Asbestos.
When I was informed I had it, I started walking, every day to get my lung capacity up. I can walk 30 blocks, pick up mail and turn right around and walk back, without stopping, without breathing hard.
And I have white lung also, from working with glass dust.
It depends on how bad you have Asbestosis, as to how easy it is to see on an x ray. They first found out I had it in the 1970's and I am still here in 2008, and am 73 so it always stays there in the lungs, but what good lung capacity you still have you can increase by exercise.
Now my Dad had black lung, and that is easily seen on an xray. But asbestosis will usually look like a spot or sometimes a mass on a lung. You see since the lungs cannot get rid of the asbestos fibers, they create fibroblasts to sorround the asbestos fibers. This will look like scar tissure,
sometimes you will read on a CT scan, diffuse pulmonary fibrosis. Now if you are doing a report on this be sure and include that it can affect the heart also. You will usually see patients with a dry cough, sometimes called a non productive cough.