European and Canadian study identifies occupations associated with lung cancer risk

Researchers pooled data from 14 European and Canadian lung cancer case–control studies to explore associations with ever having worked in different occupations. The main analysis included 13,587 men with lung cancer and 16,410 male controls, and 3,199 women with lung cancer and 4,408 female controls. Two data-driven selection methods—a least absolute shrinkage and selection operator model and a Bayesian hierarchical horseshoe model—accounted for age, study, smoking and exposure to known occupational lung carcinogens. Logistic regression was then used to estimate odds ratios for selected occupations.

Among men, mining (OR 1.28, 95% CI 1.06–1.54) and bricklaying (OR 1.30, 95% CI 1.12–1.52) were consistently associated with higher lung cancer odds. Secondary education teachers (OR 0.37, 95% CI 0.22–0.60), production managers (OR 0.66, 95% CI 0.54–0.81) and government executive officials (OR 0.72, 95% CI 0.62–0.83) had inverse associations. Among women, secondary language and literature teachers (OR 0.39, 95% CI 0.20–0.72) and government executive officials (OR 0.63, 95% CI 0.48–0.81) had inverse associations.

The findings point to occupations that may warrant further investigation for unidentified workplace factors. The reported associations do not establish causation; the analysis was exploratory and based on case–control data.