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ObjectivesTo investigate the association between occupational noise exposure and stroke incidence in a pooled study of five Scandinavian cohorts (NordSOUND).MethodsWe pooled and harmonised data from five Scandinavian cohorts resulting in 78 389 participants. We obtained job data from national registries or questionnaires and recoded these to match a job-exposure matrix developed in Sweden, which specified the annual average daily noise exposure in five exposure classes (LAeq8h): ResultsExposure to occupational noise at baseline was not associated with overall stroke in the fully adjusted models. For ischaemic stroke, occupational noise was associated with HRs (95% CI) of 1.08 (0.98 to 1.20), 1.09 (0.97 to 1.24) and 1.06 (0.92 to 1.21) in the 75–79, 80–84 and ≥85 dB(A) exposure groups, compared with ConclusionsWe found no association between occupational noise and risk of overall stroke after adjustment for confounders. However, the non-significantly increased risk of ischaemic stroke warrants further investigation.

ObjectivesFirefighters (FFs) and police forensic investigators (PFI) may be exposed to a wide range of particles and combustion products, such as the carcinogenic benzo(a)pyrene and other polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). The aim of this study was to evaluate the dermal exposure to 32 different PAHs for FFs and PFIs.MethodsThe skin was sampled by tape stripping (three consecutive tapes) on lower wrist and collarbone area after end of work shift of 7 FFs (fire starters; team leaders inside the burning house; team leaders outside the burning house) during training fires (14 samples), 9 PFIs investigating the aftermath of fire events (10 samples) and 7 office workers/control persons (7 samples). We used semipermeable membrane dialysis for clean-up of the tape strip exctracts and analysed the PAHs by gas chromatography mass spectrometry.ResultsThe median sum 32 PAH dermal exposure of the measured groups was in the range of 2 to 16 ng/cm2on the wrist and 2 to 4.6 ng/cm2on the collarbone area. Both gaseous and particle-associated PAHs were present on skin with large variability in levels between specific PAHs. The most abundant PAHs were phenanthrene, fluoranthene, and chrysene. For sum 32 PAHs the exposure of the wrist was statistically significantly higher for FF fire starters and PFIs than for controls. FF fire starters had the highest exposure for benzo(a)pyrene. For the collarbone area, the FFs and PFIs had lower exposures than on the wrist and similar to the levels for control persons.ConclusionsThe dermal occupational PAH exposure for FFs and PFIs was generally higher on the wrist than on the collarbone area. Thus, the wrists seem to be less well protected by personal protective equipment than the collarbone area. On the collarbone area, the dermal PAH exposure levels were similar between FFs, PFIs and control persons.