Methodological aspects of epidemiological studies on the use of mobile phones and their association with brain tumors

• Our case-control studies were the first to report an association between the use of mobile or cordless phonesand brain tumors; glioma and acoustic neuroma. Criticism of these results has been based partly on results from the Interphonestudies conducted under the auspice of the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC). Here, we comparestudy design and epidemiological methods used in our studies and the Interphone studies. We conclude that while ourresults appear sound and reliable, several of the Interphone findings display differential misclassification of exposure dueto observational and recall bias, for example, following low participation rates in both cases and controls and bed-sidecomputer guided interviews of cases rather than blinded interviews of cases and controls. However, as we have presentedelsewhere, there seems to be a consistent pattern of an association between mobile phone use and ipsilateral glioma andacoustic neuroma using > 10 years latency period.

Nyckelord

Acoustic neuroma

cellular phones

cordless phones

case-control studies

methods

Interphone

epidemiology

glioma

microwaves

Publikations- och innehållstyp

ref (ämneskategori)

art (ämneskategori)