Asbestosis surveillance

Proportion of asbestosis cases identified by data source, BC

In brief

• Asbestosis is a progressive fibrotic lung disease caused by inhalation of asbestos fibres.
• It has one of the highest mortality rates of all occupational diseases in BC, and it represents a high financial cost to the compensation system.
• We used accepted workers’ compensation claims, in-patient hospitalizations, and outpatient visits to physicians to estimate the incidence of asbestosis in the BC population over time and by demographic, occupational, and geographic characteristics.
• We found that the most common industries of exposure for workers’ compensation asbestosis claims were related to construction, followed by ship building, smelting, and pulp and paper.
• From 1992 to 2004, workers’ compensation claim rates for asbestosis remained stable or dropped relative to an increase in the rate of asbestosis as measured by medical services records.
• No single data source was sufficient to identify all new cases of asbestosis; therefore, the true burden of the disease in BC is likely seriously underestimated.
• In fact, only 3% of the 1,170 new asbestosis cases we identified were recorded in all three data sources. One quarter of the cases were identified in the workers’ compensation records, a further one third of cases were found only in the hospitalization database, and another third in the medical services database.

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Contact: Chris McLeod