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Tania Carreón,¹ Mary Ann Butler,¹ Avima M. Ruder,¹ Martha A. Waters,¹ Karen E. Davis-King,¹
Geoffrey M. Calvert,¹ Paul A. Schulte,¹ Barbara Connally,¹ Elizabeth M. Ward,¹ Wayne T. Sanderson,¹ Ellen F. Heineman,² Jack S. Mandel,³ Roscoe F. Morton,⁴ Douglas J. Reding,⁵ Kenneth D. Rosenman,⁶ Glenn Talaska,⁷ and the Brain Cancer Collaborative Study Group

¹National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA; ²National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, Rockville, Maryland, USA; ³School of Public Health, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA; ⁴Mercy Foundation, Des Moines, Iowa, USA; ⁵Natural Farm Medicine Center, Marshfield Clinic, Marshfield, Wisconsin, USA; ⁶Department of Medicine, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, USA; ⁷Department of Environmental Health, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA

Abstract
An excess incidence of brain cancer in male farmers has been noted in several studies, but few studies have focused on women. The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health Upper Midwest Health Study evaluated effects of rural exposures for 341 female glioma cases and 528 controls, all adult (18-80 years of age) nonmetropolitan residents of Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin. On average, controls lived longer on farms than did cases. After adjusting for age, age group, education, and farm residence, no association with glioma was observed for exposure to arsenicals, benzoic acids, carbamates, chloroacetanilides, dinitroanilines, inorganics, organochlorines, organophosphates, phenoxys, triazines, or urea-based or estrogenic pesticides. An increased risk of glioma was observed for carbamate herbicides but was not statistically significant (odds ratio = 3.0 ; 95% confidence interval, 0.9-9.5) . No association was observed between glioma and exposure to 12 widely used specific pesticides, after adjustment for age, age group, education, and any other pesticide exposure. These results were not affected after exclusion of proxy respondents (43% of cases, 2% of controls) . Women were less likely than men to have applied pesticides, but more likely to have laundered pesticide-contaminated clothes. Storing pesticides in the house was associated with a statistically non-significant increased risk. Results show that exposure to pesticides was not associated with an increased risk of intracranial gliomas in women. Other farm-related factors could be etiologic factors and will be discussed in future reports. Key words: brain cancer, case-control, farmers, glioma, Midwest, pesticides, women. Environ Health Perspect 113:546-551 (2005) . doi:10.1289/ehp.7456 available via http://dx.doi.org/ [Online 9 February 2005]

Address correspondence to T. Carreón, Division of Surveillance, Hazard Evaluations and Field Studies, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, 4676 Columbia Parkway, Mailstop R-16, Cincinnati, OH 45226 USA. Telephone: (513) 841-4440. Fax: (513) 841-4486. E-mail: carreota@ucmail.uc.edu

We thank the study participants and respondents, the physicians and institutions who ascertained cases and who provided copies of pathology reports, and the interviewers, phlebotomists, and other staff at the state centers and coordinating center. We also thank the NIOSH staff who participated in protocol development, contract monitoring, data cleaning, and data analysis, and manuscript reviewers for their helpful comments.

This study was funded in part by the NIOSH Initiative for Cancer Control for Farmers and in part by CDC/NIOSH operating funds.

The authors declare they have no competing financial interests.

Received 28 July 2004 ; accepted 9 February 2005.

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