Flight attendants are individuals
that assist you during long hours of air travel. They can help in maintaining a
personal level of comfortability and safety during a long and tiring flight. Though
typically not regarded as a dangerous profession, flight attendants are exposed
to many occupational hazards that most have not considered before. These
hazards include circadian rhythm disruptions, cosmic radiation exposure and
secondhand smoke exposure. Since the 1990's smoking on commercial airliners has
been banned due to the high negative health impacts associated with second hand
smoke exposure.
Flight
attendants that worked on aircrafts before this ban experienced higher levels
of breast cancer and melanoma. In a recent study, researchers discovered a link
associated with the flight attendants and miscarriages. A total of 145 flight
attendants exposed to secondhand smoke before the 1990’s were found to have a 26%
miscarriage rate. This was compared to 17.1% that was reported by the national
report from the CDC.
Overall,
it was determined that the flight attendants did in fact have a higher
incidence of miscarriage, but it was not related to secondhand smoke exposure.
This lead to the thought that the other occupational hazards played a significant
role in their increased miscarriage rate. The disruption of the circadian
rhythm and radiation exposure are thought to be related to the reproductive
health of individuals. Though further investigation is needed, a question that
this study invokes would be that should a higher degree of caution be taken towards
pregnant flight attendants? This question is relevant when considering the
impact of long flight hours and the presence of teratogens during embryological
development.
If considered
properly, a future concern would need to be emphasized regarding the specific
precautions that would need to be taken with pregnant flight attendants. The goal
would be to decrease the time spent in the sky to prevent the possibility of a
miscarriage form occurring.
http://www.amjmed.com/article/S0002-9343(17)30611-3/fulltext
I'm a little confused on this post. Are you saying the connection between miscarriages and flight attendants are due to the radiation exposure and its effect on the teratogens? What specifically are teratogens? I agree that disrupting the circadian rhythm can have some detrimental effects on a persons health, but how effective would this be against pregnant women? Also how would one go about testing these two different hypotheses (i.e. the uv exposure and the circadian rhythm)? Also, since pregnant woman are at higher risk potentially how do you suggest airlines handle these cases? Do you think they should give complete time off (a total of 9 months)? How would they tackle the unexpected surprise pregnancies?
ReplyDeletePerhaps another study that would help the research question that you asked is what is the percent difference of conception in flight attendants versus the normal population. Surely I would believe that the flight attendants would have lower conception rates due to the circadian rhythm disruptions alone. This is because not sleeping at consistent regular times can cause stress to an individual and we know that this leads to lower progesterone levels, the main ingredient for thickening the endometrium and conception. In the article below, researchers found that active flight attendants experienced more menstrual irregularities than former flight attendants. Irregularities in the menstrual phase can mean irregularities in the whole uterine cycle, which typically causes less conception in women.
ReplyDeleteHere's a link to the article: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16708534
I completely agree with you on this statement. There is not much literature or research regarding the reproductive health of female flight attendants. I personally feel that much more research would need to be performed to determine the exact cause of this disruption because I don't think that a circadian rhythm disruption alone would be enough to cause a high level of miscarriages. The article you provided is extremely interesting and useful, thank you very much.
Delete