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Public concern has been expressed about the possible adverse health effects of mobile telephones, mainly related to intracranial tumors. We conducted a population-based case-control study to investigate the relationship between mobile phone use and risk of glioma among 1,522 glioma patients and 3,301 controls. We found no evidence of increased risk of glioma related to regular mobile phone use (odds ratio, OR = 0.78, 95% confidence interval, CI: 0.68, 0.91). No significant association was found across categories with duration of use, years since first use, cumulative number of calls or cumulative hours of use. When the linear trend was examined, the OR for cumulative hours of mobile phone use was 1.006 (1.002, 1.010) per 100 hr, but no such relationship was found for the years of use or the number of calls. We found no increased risks when analogue and digital phones were analyzed separately. For more than 10 years of mobile phone use reported on the side of the head where the tumor was located, an increased OR of borderline statistical significance (OR = 1.39, 95% CI 1.01, 1.92, p trend 0.04) was found, whereas similar use on the opposite side of the head resulted in an OR of 0.98 (95% CI 0.71, 1.37). Although our results overall do not indicate an increased risk of glioma in relation to mobile phone use, the possible risk in the most heavily exposed part of the brain with long-term use needs to be explored further before firm conclusions can be drawn., ((c) 2007 Wiley-Liss, Inc.)

It has been reported that the incidence of meningioma increased in several industrialized countries in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The aim of this study was to evaluate the time trends in incidence of meningiomas in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden, with emphasis on the age distribution and sex ratio. Information about cases of meningiomas in people aged 15-84 years was obtained from the cancer registries of these Nordic countries for the years 1968-1997, and estimates of person-years at risk were calculated from information provided by the national population registries. Age-specific incidence rates per 100,000 and incidence rate ratios were calculated for 3-year periods. The female:male ratios were also evaluated. The combined incidence among men increased from 1.4 to 1.9 per 100,000 during the follow-up period, the corresponding rates for women were 2.6 and 4.5. The female:male ratio increased over time for several age groups and was as high as 3.5:1 in the group aged 40-44 years in the latest follow-up period (1993-1997). In summary, our results provide some support for the idea that the introduction of computed tomography in the late 1970s has had an impact on the detection of cases in people aged 60 and over. The decrease in the rate or detection postmortem has affected the incidence time trend, but it also coincides with widespread use of new imaging technologies. The increasing trend shown for the female:male ratio in the group aged 35-59 years is consistent with the possibility that increasing use of hormones may affect the incidence of meningiomas in women., (Copyright 2005 Wiley-Liss, Inc)

Our case-control study was conducted to investigate whether residential and occupational exposure to magnetic fields increased the risk for brain tumours in adults. Data from an occupational exposure matrix was also evaluated. The study population in this nested case-control study was made up of subjects aged 16 years and older who had resided in a broad corridor around a high-voltage power line in 1980 or during one of the years from 1986-1996. The cases were incident cases diagnosed during 1980-96. Two controls were matched to each case by year of birth, sex, municipality and first year entering the cohort. The time-weighted average exposure to residential magnetic fields generated by the power lines was calculated for the exposure follow-up from 1 January 1967 to diagnosis. In addition, job titles and branches of industry were classified as categories of hours per week in a magnetic field above background level (0.1 microT). Exposures were cumulated over occupationally active years for the exposure follow-up from 1 January 1955 to diagnosis. When residential magnetic fields are evaluated, the 2 upper residential, time-weighted, average magnetic field categories showed elevated odds ratios (ORs) for all brain tumours (OR = 1.6; 95% confidence interval [95%CI] 0.9-2.7 and OR = 1.3; 95% CI 0.7-2.3). Occupational exposure showed no association to exposure for any site. We found an elevated risk for residential exposure to magnetic fields and brain tumours, although the risk was not significant, and no clear exposure-response pattern was found. The findings for the occupational exposure groups showed an inverse association., ((c) 2005 Wiley-Liss, Inc.)

Brain tumors are some of the most lethal adult cancers and there is a concern that the incidence is increasing. It has been suggested that the reported increased incidence can be explained by improvements in diagnostic procedures, although this has not been totally resolved. The aim of our study was to describe the incidence trends of adult primary intracerebral tumors in four Nordic countries during a period with introduction of new diagnostic procedures and increasing prevalence of mobile phone users. Information about benign and malignant primary intracerebral tumor cases 20-79 years of age was obtained from the national cancer registries in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden for the years 1969-98 and estimates of person-years at risk were calculated from the information obtained from national population registries. Annual age standardized incidence rates per 100,000 person-years were calculated and time trends analyses were carried out using Poisson regression. The overall incidence of all intracerebral tumors ranged from 8.4-11.8 for men and 5.8-9.3 for women, corresponding to an average annual increase of 0.6% for men (95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.4, 0.7) and 0.9% for women (95% CI = 0.7, 1.0). The increase in the incidence was confined to the late 1970s and early 1980s and coinciding with introduction of improved diagnostic methods. This increase was largely confined to the oldest age group. After 1983 and during the period with increasing prevalence of mobile phone users, the incidence has remained relatively stable for both men and women., (Copyright 2003 Wiley-Liss, Inc.)