Occupation and Parkinson disease in Women’s Health Initiative Observational Study

Abstract

AbstractIntroductionThere is a lack of consistency in associations between workplace factors and risk of Parkinson disease (PD), and paucity of such data on women. We took a classic occupational epidemiology approach that assesses associations with occupational groups in order to derive insights about potential occupation-specific exposures that may be causal.MethodsThe Women’s Health Initiative (WHI-OS) is a prospective cohort that enrolled 91,627 postmenopausal women, 50 to 79 years of age from 10/01/93 to 12/31/98, at 40 clinical centers across the US with average follow-up of 11 years, who reported up to three paid jobs held the longest since age 18; these jobs were coded and duration of employment calculated. We defined the case by self-report of doctor-diagnosed PD (at baseline or follow-up), death attributed to PD, or medication consistent with PD.ResultsAmong 2,590 cases, we report evidence of excess risk among “counselors, social workers, and other community and social service specialists”. There was a suggestion of increase in risk among post-secondary teachers, and “building and grounds cleaning and maintenance”. There was also evidence of deficit in risk among women who worked in sales.Results with ever-employed and duration were similar, except for evidence of excess of risk among “health technologists and technicians” with more than 20 years of employment. Longer duration of life on a farm was associated with higher risk.ConclusionOur findings paint a largely reassuring picture of occupational risks for PD among US women, especially for trades largely unaffected by recent technological advances.