Philip Morris
Epidemiology Studies of the Relationship Between Passive Smoking and Lung Cancer
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- Kabat, G.C.
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- 2026223571/3912
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- MARG, MARGINALIA
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- Winter Toxicology Forum
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- 05 Jun 1998
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DR. KABAT: Thank you. P9 ~ 0 s!,I w', ~ Tc r / 9 9 0, /~. B 7-
The problem of passive smoking and lung,cancer has provoked a good deal of debate bothh
on a scientific and on a public policy level. Do the studies that purport' to ~ show an association
of'
exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) and lung cancer occurruig;in lifetime nonsmokers
provide adequate evidence to resolve the issue? As Nancy Haley has just shown, she and her,
colleagues are very good I at' measuring recent exposure to ETS using cotiniae measured in saliva,
serum, and urine. Unfortunately, these biomarkers are not helpful for assessing exposure over the
severall dt.cades relevant to the induction of lung cancer. Given the lack of a biomarker for long-
term exposure to ~ ETS, epidemiologic studies have had to rely on self-reports or proxy-reports of
ETS exposure.
I propose to raise what' I consider to be some of'tlie key aspects of the roughly 15
epidemiologic studies of'the issue of' ETS and lung cancer and to point' out certain areas that
require
further study; I will briefly refer to our own study which is still in progress at the American
Health
Foundation. Finally,, I! will suggest a possible direction for further study of this issue.
EPIDEMIOLAG'IIC
Table 1 lists studies exam' g the lung cancer risk of'non-smoking wives of smoking
husbands compar',d to the non-smoking wives of'non-smoking husbands: : One notes that the,
greatest magnitude of the overall relative risk (RR) is 2.1. After the Tnchopoulos and Cocrea
studies, the highest RR is 1.65' (Lam et al.). The national Research Council's committee on passive
smoking carried our a mcta-analysis of' the existing studies in 1986 and came up with an overall RAt
of 1.34 (95!% aonfidence interval: 1.18-1-53) (1).
In four out of the fifteen studies listed, the overall RR is statistically significant. When
one examines the data by level of exposure, i,e., number of cigarettes per day smoked' by the
husband stratifie& into two or more ltvels, 8 of'the 15 studies show evidence of a dose-response
relationship..
HISTOLOGY
When~ we look at the effect of ETS' exposure by histologic type, we see an interesting
discrepancy (Table 2). Dalager et al. (2) and Pershagen et aL (3) show roughly comparably elevated
odds ratios (OR) for squamous cell and small cell carcinomas combines, but not for
adenocarcinoma. In contrast, Lam et all (4) obtained a significant effect for adenocarinoma~ but not
for squamous cell carcinoma.
The results of Hirayama's study (5) presumably agree on this point with those of Lam et
al., since the majority of'his lung cancer cases were apparently adenocarcinoma. Trichopoulos et al.
results (6) presumably weigh im on the side of Dalager et al. and Pershagen et al., since
Trichopoulos excluded adenocarinoma and terminal' bronchial carcinoma from their series.
Since adenocarinoma occurs more commonly in never smokers than in~smokers and~
generally more commonly in women than in men (7), one would expect that if' ETS exposure is an
appreciable risk factor for lung; cancer, it is associated with adenocarcinoma, as well as possibly
with
other types. Tlie inconsistency in the results to date regarding histology indicates that this is
one
area that merits further study.
'
187
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ASSESSMENT OF DISEASE STATUS'
Misclassification on disease status occurs when diagnoses other than primary carcinoma of
the lung are included in ! the case series or when, a primary cancer of the lung, is included among
the
controls due to its having gone undetected: Garfinkel et al. reported that of 283 women.listed: as
having lung cancer in hospital rerords but with no mention of'their having smoked, 36 (12.7%'0)
turned' out to, have diagnoses other than lung cancer when the histology was reviewed by one of the
authors (8).
In.istudies in which histologic verification of lung cancer is a criterion for inelusion in the
study, n+isclassiFcation should'be minimaL However,,some of'tlte studies listed in Table 1 were
lacking this for all cases.
It should also be mentioned that even when lung cancer is histologically verified, it is
possible that some :cases jttdged'to be primary cancer of the lung are actually secondary to a,
cancer
of another site that has gone undetected.
ASSESS14f I+IT OF EXPOSURE STATUS'.
This is a, greater problem than assessment of disease status, and for some investigators it
is the key problem of epidemiologic studies of ETS' and lung cancer (9,10).
Misclassifieation of'exposure status can occur in a number of'ways. First, subjects who
have smoked for some period! of'their life can be erroneously included in a study of never smokers.
Second; subjects may under-report (minimize) or over-report (inflate) their ETS exposure, or this
may be done by proxies: A third type of misclassification can occur wheni some indirect measure
(such as whetber the subject is married to a smoker or how much the spouse smokes) is used as an
indicator of ETS exposure. The effect of miselassification ~ on the estimate of the RR depends on
whether the misclhssifeation is random or differential (t.hat is systematic). Random
misclassification
will bias the estimate of the RR toward the null, thus making an effect, if there is one, more
diffcult
to detect. If misclassification on ex asure differs between cases and controls, the estimate of the
RR
'
can be biased either upwards or downwards depending on the direction of the bias (11).
Mirsclassification of active smokers as never smokers.
Garfinkel and co-workers found that among lung cancer cases identified as 'nonsmokers^
or lhcking, any mention 1 of smoking in the hospital record, 40% were revealed to have smoked upon
reinterview (8). Although a detailed personal interview yields more accurate smoking,histories than
reliance on hospital charts, if is still likely tJ;at, even when subjects are directly'interviewed
and moree
so when various proxies are used, some misel ' ucation of smokers as nonsmokers occurs.
Lee has argued that random misclassification of smokers as non-smokers coupled' with a
tendency of smokers to marry smokers could account for the observed association, of a spouse's
smoking and! increased'.lung,cancer risk in non-smoking spouses (9). Assuming a 5%
misclassification of'smokutg subjects, a RR' of 20 for active smoking, no true elI'ect' of
passi've.e
smoking, and a between-spouse smoking concordance of 3.45, Lee demonstrates the effects of such a
bias. These include an apparent effeci of passive smoking (RR = 1.75) and the creation of a large
proportion of'true smokers among the self-reported non-smokers with lung cancer.
188
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Misclussif~cation of self-reported ETS erposure.
A study by Pron et al. (12) suggcsts that mi' ~~~i!ication of self-reported: ET'S exposure
may be euensive. They examined the reliability of responses in 1 117 control subjects who 1 had
participated in, a study of passive smoking and who were reinterviewed on average six months later.
Responses to an initnal question about exposure to ETS (yes/no) were more reliablt for exposure at
home than at work (Tablo 3). Reproduabdity ofquestions concerning exposure to a spouse's smoke
(yes/no) was high for both sexes, with the reliability being generally lower for other family
members.
Quantitative measures ofi E'TS exposure, ie, number and duration of exposures, were generally less
reliable than qualitative (or dichotomous) , meastu es. In general, non-smokers gave more reliable
information on all parameters of E'TS exposure than smokers.
Unfortunately the study by Pron et al, did not examine the reliability of responses among
cases as well as among controls. In case-control!studios particularly one must be concerned that the
case's reporting of exposure maybe influenced by his diagnosis. In a study of lung cancer occurring
in non-smokers, this could take the form of cases probing past exposures more intensively than
controls and over-reporting exposures to ~ ETS, since some cases may feel compelled to find an
explanation for their disease. On the other hand, it is also possible that cases might mini*ni~r
their
exposures out of an unwillingness to. blame a spouse.
MJsclQSsification due to use the spouse's srnokingltabits.
Using the presence of a smoking spouse as an indicator of ETS exposure can lead to
serious misclassification of exposure. Based I on a survey of nearly 38,000 never- and ex-smokers,
Friedman et aL (13) reported that the sensitivity and speci6dty of using the presence of a smoking
spouse as a~ predictor of actual ETS exposure were quire poor. Thirty-nine percent of men and, 47%
of women married'to smokers reported zero hours of exposure at home. Conversely, 49% of men
and! 41% of women marrned to non+smokers reported some ETS exposure.
CONFOUNDING
Confounding is another major problhm ~ area for the evaluation of epidemiologic studies of
ETS and lung cancer and one that, has received relatively little attentionl
Several studies suggest that a variety of factors could' act as confounders of an ETS -limg
cancer association. Friedman (13)' found that age bore a strong negative relationship to reported
ETS exposure. Hours per week of ETS exposure were associated with alcohol consumption,
marijuana use, being,currently unmarried, and, in a U-shaped, fashionwith 'no college education."
Koo, Ho; and Rylander (14) examined a wide variety of behaviors of the non-smoking
wives of smoking and non-smoking husbands in Hong Kong. They concluded that in general wives
with husbands who had never smoked had I healthier lifestyles than wives with smoking husbands.
Specifically, the former were of higher socioeconomic status, were more conscientious housewives,
ate better diets, and had higher indices of family cohesiveness as well as better health status.
A third study, by Sidney et al. (15) reported that dietary B-carotene intake was
significantly lower in non-smokers exposed I to passive smoke at home than ! in non-smokers who were
not exposed, after adjustment for ag e, sex, race, education, status, body weight, and alcohol
intake.
189

They'concluded that dietary B-carotene intake was a potentiall confounder of the relationship
between, E"'S and lung cancer.
Other potential confounders included: occupation, domestic radon exposure, a, history'of
exposure to therapeutic x-rays, and keeping pet bird5 in the home. This last is raised by a recent
study from the hfe'therlands which found t}iat the odds ratio for lung, cancer among people who kept
pet birds in their home was 6.7 (95% confidence interva12:2-20.0) after adjustment, for active
smoking and vitamin C intake :(16). This'siudy did not assess ETS exposure among the subjects.
THE AN1M1CAN HEALTH' FOUNDATION STUM7('
Since 1983, a study of ETS' and lung cancer in never smokers has been in progress at the
American Healt;h Foundation. Alllung cancer cases interviewed in the context of'a large, multi-
center study of tobacco-related diseases who report never having smoked~ more than one cigarette
per day for a year are given a dtstailed i ETS questionnaire.
For each case, 2-3 hospitalized controls who have diagnoses not known to be associated
with tobacco use and who are also lifetime non-smokers are interviewed. Controls are matched to
cases on age (+/- 5 years)y sex, race, hospital, and date of interview (wiuhin 3 months).
The items in the questionnaire inditde exposure :m utero; in childhood (specific family
members who smoked, years of exposure and average number of hours of'exposure per day, and a
subjective rating of the intensity of exposure), in adulthoodt aC home (specifac family membersrwho
smoke(d), number of cpd smoked by eaeh, years of exposure, number of hours per day, subjective
rating of exposure, and where a spouse smoked;,whetber he or she smoked in the bednoom); in the
workplace (number of' hours per week, years of exposure, number of smokers within ten, feet of
subject, rating of exposure) ' for up to four different' jobs; and in various forms
of'transportation andi
in social situations.
Ln, addition to ETS questions, information is obtained on demographic factors, occupation,,
alcohol consumption, medical'. history, diet, and other factors. To date, this study has accrued a
total
of 90 lung cancer cases and 247 matched controls. We plan to continue recruiting subjects for the
study in order to reach a~ sample size of 150 cases. Table 4gives a breakdown of the histology of
lung,cancer by sex:
Preliffiinary analyses of the data do not' indieate any striking,ETS exposure differences
between cases and controls. Tables' 5 and 6 give crude odds ratios and confidence intervals for
overall' exposure in childhood, adulthood at home, and in1 the workplace, in males and females,
respectively. With the possible exception of exposure in childhood and among women, there is little
suggestion of excess risk duetio1ETS. A fuller analysis of'tihese data, including adjustment for
covariates, is in progress.
CoYVeLUSrOM
Epidemiologic studies of ETS and1ing cancer generally suffer from smalllsample size.
Given the small magnitude of the observed RR associated with passive smoking,and!the probltzms
associated'with multiple histologic types bias, miscla.ssification, and confoundIng, increasing thee
sample size is one way to attempt to answer the ETS-lung cancer question with greater certainty. A
case-control study of 10,000 lung cancer cases (7,500males andl2,5(90~females) could'be expected to
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yield approximately 150 male and 250 female never smokers, based on estimates of the frequency of
lung, cancer among never smokers (2% ~ for males and 10°.'b for females [7[). Table 7 shows the
sample sizcs ncceasary in,eaeh group (assuming,eqlLal numbers of cases and controls) to deteu'RRs
between 1?5 and 200,,with a one-tailed alpha of 5%' and 80% power, given varimus proportions of
exposed controls.
While it is highly unlikeIy that such a study would i be funded solely to assess the effects of
LTS exposure, the study could' be designed ~ to make an important contribution to the radon-lung
cancer issue as well. Spe 'c~f'icaitj!, studies of domestic radon exposure have also suffered from
small
sample sizes and have produced variable and unstable estimates of the ris t of radon exposure in
never smokers. In addition, there is a need to better assess the interactive effects of active
smoking
and radon exposure. Since ETS and radon exposure are both risk factors for lung cancer, and since
one may confound, or interact with, the other, a large study designed to measure both factors ass
reliably as possible would have considerable scientific merit.
191
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Prospective Studies
Hirayama (1981)
Carfinkei (1981)
Case-Control Studies
Trichopoulos, et al. (1981)
Chan & Fung (1982)
Correa, et al. (1983)
Koo, et al. (1983)
Kabat & Wynder (1984)
Wu, et al. (1985)
Garfinkel, et al. (1985)
Lee, et al. (1985)
Akiba, et at. (1986)
Dalager, et ai. (1986)
Pershagen, et at. (1987)
Lam, et at. (1987)
Koo, et at. (1987)
Table I
Epid emiologic Studies
Re/a ti ve Risk
1.63
1.18
2.1
0.75
2.03
1.54
0.79
1.2
1.12
1.03
1.48
1.5
1.28
1.65
1.55
95% C.L
1.25 - 2.11
0.90 - 1.54
1.18 - 3.78
0.44 - 1.30
0.83 - 5.03
0.90 2.64
0.26 - 2.43
0.6 - 2.5
0.74 - 1.69
0.41 - 2.47
0.88 - 2.50
0.8 - 2.8
0.75 - 2.16
1.16-2.35
0.94 - 3.08
,,
TIBEM2O%

~
_ _._.. ~... ... a.A W i W
Table 2
Cell Type Related to Spouse's Smoking
w
Study Histo%gic rype N 4dds Ratfo 95% C. l_
*
Adenocarcinoma 16 1.02 0.33 - 3.16
Dalager et al. Squamous & Small
*
(1986) Ce{I Ca
. 14 2.88 0.91 - 9.10
Other 18 1.31 'k 0.48 - 3.57
Squamous or 20 3
3 1 -1 1
4
1
Pershagen et al. Small Cell Ca. . .
.
(1987)
Other 47 0.8 0.4 - 1.5
Adenocarcinoma 131 2.12 1.32 - 3.39
Lam et al.
(1987) Squamous Cell Ca. 27 0.85 0.35 - 2.06
Small Cell Ca. 8 3.00 0.53 -16.9
Adjusted for gender, age, and study area.
zZgE2:V,J2o2:

Table 3:
Reproducibility of ETS Exposure Data
C?u+estiorz Kappa value
Ever lived
with regular
smoker?
0.66
Ever exposed
j to smoke at
work?
0.46
Nlo. of resident
smokers? 0.515
No. of jiob sites
re poirtsd? 0.37
i Duration, of
residential
exposure? I
0.45
Source: Pron et al., 1988
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Table 4
Histology of Lung Cancer Among Never-Smokers
Ma/es
N ( % ) Females
N ( % )
Squamous & 5 (13.5) 10 (18.9)
Small Cell Ca.
Adenoca. 25 (67.6) 26 (49.1)
Large Cell Ca. 5 (13.5) 6 (11.3)
BAC 1 ( 2.7) 7 (13.2)
Other 1 ( 2.7) , 4 (7.5)
37 53
tZSEzzJzOz

Table 5
American Health Foundation Study
Males.
Cases Controls OR 95% C.1.
xposed in
Childhood:
No 15 36 1.00
Yes 21 69 0.73 0.34 - 1.59
~ Exposed in
Adulthood-
at home- .41
No 23 68 1.00 -----
Ye s 13 32 1.20 0.54 - 2.68
Exposed at
Work (ever):
No 16 4 5 1.00 -----
Ye s 21 80 0.98 0.46 - 2.10
siSuzzqz0z
