Skip Navigation


Radiation Protection Dosimetry Advance Access originally published online on October 16, 2008
Radiation Protection Dosimetry 2008 132(2):246-254; doi:10.1093/rpd/ncn261
This Article
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow All Versions of this Article:
132/2/246    most recent
ncn261v1
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Adam, M.
Right arrow Articles by Kuehni, C. E.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Adam, M.
Right arrow Articles by Kuehni, C. E.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Childhood leukaemia and socioeconomic status: what is the evidence?

Martin Adam, Cornelia E. Rebholz, Matthias Egger, Marcel Zwahlen and Claudia E. Kuehni*

Swiss Childhood Cancer Registry, Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine, University of Bern, Finkenhubelweg 11, Bern CH-3012, Switzerland

* Corresponding author: kuehni{at}ispm.unibe.ch

The objectives of this systematic review are to summarise the current literature on socioeconomic status (SES) and the risk of childhood leukaemia, to highlight methodological problems and formulate recommendations for future research. Starting from the systematic review of Poole et al. (Socioeconomic status and childhood leukaemia: a review. Int. J. Epidemiol. 2006;35(2):370–384.), an electronic literature search was performed covering August 2002–April 2008. It showed that (1) the results are heterogeneous, with no clear evidence to support a relation between SES and childhood leukaemia; (2) a number of factors, most importantly selection bias, might explain inconsistencies between studies; (3) there is some support for an association between SES at birth (rather than later in childhood) and childhood leukaemia and (4) if there are any associations, these are weak, limited to the most extreme SES groups (the 10–20% most or least deprived). This makes it unlikely that they would act as strong confounders in research addressing associations between other exposures and childhood leukaemia. Future research should minimise case and control selection bias, distinguish between different SES measures and leukaemia subtypes and consider timing of exposures and cancer outcomes.


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.