Cll and solvents

[KHuff]

Hi folks, I am wondering if there is any info on here about the link between CLL and solvents?

[Cllcanada Top Poster CURE Hero]

There is thought to be an increased risk in CLL to workplace exposure to TCE trichloroethylene , but no causation...

oem.bmj.com/content/70/11/7...

oem.bmj.com/content/70/8/59...

There is a bit of research on organics as well... like acetone etc.

oem.bmj.com/content/67/10/6...

atsdr.cdc.gov/substances/to...

~chris

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[ygtgo in reply to Cllcanada]

I used to use lots of Acetone when working as an industrial Glassblower ... we would work the glass then wash it in Hydrofluoric acid, rinse and let it dry, and then wipe it down with Acetone before it went into the annealing ovens.

I called in the Health & Safety Executive when I had a Corneal ulcer ... it turned out that I should have been kitted out like a spaceman when dealing with the high temperatures, and chemicals ...

Too late to help me .... I never worked again / didn't even get compensation.

[newyork8 in reply to ygtgo]

That stinks. Sorry to hear. People a lot more aware now

[Hidden in reply to Cllcanada]

Back in the 1960's I worked with various solvents (TriC ,toluene, acetone etc.) cleaning silk screens used to print the heated automobile rear windows. This was during the development phase of the process. I was dx'ed in 2006 with CLL. I have not been able to contact the other two people I worked with to see if they also have CLL. I have been curious about that.

[KHuff]

I'm specifically looking for more connection between wood preservatives and CLL.

[Cllcanada Top Poster CURE Hero in reply to KHuff]

Like what... there are over a dozen types wood perservatives... to my knowledge they have been looked at in conjunction with lymphomas.

Black hair dye however has been studied...and there is increased risk.

[KHuff]

Pentachlorophenol, zinc naphthenate, copper-arsenic, for starters. I specifically asked my CLL doctor about hair dye, and he said it was fine.

[Champlain]

Check out Benzene, it has and is used as a solvent and other like toluene and zylene and also in many other chemical products. It noted to be linked to leukemia. I believe my CLL has been caused by exposures to those chemical in my workplace for many many years.

[PattiM in reply to Champlain]

I used lacquers and zylene every day for about 15 years working in the printing industry. We would paint film with the red lacquer on our tables all day. No extra ventilation. Clean them with zylene. At one time out of 50 employees, 2 were being treated for Hodgkin's lymphoma. One 52 year old and another 24 yr old woman. We did not make the connection. 😣

[LoganS]

I too wonder about my 30 career owning a pest control company. In the early yrs little consideration was given to mask, gloves, etc. many organo-phosphates used, now outlawed.

[Cllcanada Top Poster CURE Hero in reply to LoganS]

Recent Europe wide study links increased risk of lymphomas with organophosphates and a number of commercial farm chemicals...

but increased risk..is not causation.

Interlymph study 2016

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

DDT

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/253...

Spanish study

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

Farm Women's Health Study Iowa

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

Hair Dye study

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/159...

~chris

[LoganS in reply to Cllcanada]

Thanks for those links Chris. The few i looked at made wish i was wiser when younger. Thanks for caution that a high risk does not in itself that exposure is the reason i may have CLL. Please keep posting your links to important information

[ladyprescott in reply to LoganS]

In the early 1980's I worked 18 month for a pest control company. I didn't work directly with the chemicals, but inhaled the smell from them for that length of time. I've always wondered about my exposure and CLL. Also, and this is for us girls, I had acrylic nails for about 30 years. Chemicals breathed in the shop and chemicals put on my nails that taken into the body may cause (and not proved) CLL. Hair dye for many years. Does all of this contribute to CLL????? Will never know.

[LoganS in reply to ladyprescott]

You bring up a good point ladyprescott. We have so much synthetics in our daily lived.

[ladyprescott in reply to LoganS]

I thought of many more daily things we use like hair spray, home cleaning products, wearing clothes that have come from the cleaners and the chemicals used there. And, for me a new home with all the fumes given off from new carpet and cabinets and the chemicals used to make them. So many things in our lives. That's why I can't pin point one thing, there are so many.

[SeymourB]

I used solvents in electronics even as a kid. So this is very interesting to me. It's particularly interesting to me to note that the U.S. Veterans Administration only allows benefits for people who served in areas where Agent Orange, an herbicide used during the Viet Nam war. Veterans argue, though, that the VA's standards are too high. Often the law regarding such benefits depends on politics, I think.

We often see reports of "links" - statistical associations - in media reports. The term is almost useless in legal or medical situations. More and more, I don't bother to read reports about links.

I'm not a lawyer, but in general I've found that "links" have to be successfully asserted in multiple courts to establish a precedence that might be honored in subsequent cases. Courts may support a link as a legal causation even if scientists do not claim scientific causation. When scientists later find the ultimate cause is different, cases can be overturned.

In science, a link is only a first step in trying to prove causation. There are often confounding factors. A third set of phenomena may actually cause the disease in combination of the linked substance. For example, a second chemical that is often or usually mixed with the suspected linked chemical may be the cause. Sunlight may be a factor. Method of exposure - breathed vs skin vs ingested by mouth, because the chemical may be broken down or combined with other molecules when entering the body. Age and demographics are often a factor. So a big issue in study design is the questionnaire that tries to find all the possible confounding factors. The exact wording of the questions makes a difference.

Meanwhile, back at the lab, scientists will often first do murine (mouse) studies. Study design has to take into account dosage. Usually, a much higher dosage is used in order to produce results faster. But the response of cells to a substance is not necessarily linear. Common foods can cause cancer at sufficiently high dosages, but at usual dosages, no cancer can be found statistically even in extremely large populations.

So, I think the gold standard is that the cancer can be demonstrated in a lab in human cells with exactly the same chemical and other factors. That's really hard to do in real life, because we can't ethically experiment on actual humans. Plus simply mixing a chemical with a cell does not duplicate how a human is exposed to the chemical. But advances in biochemistry, especially in genetics, is allowing scientists to determine exactly which genes are involved, and how they are mutated.

Finally, we often see substances linked to lymphomas. CLL is a type of lymphoma, but there's more than 60 types. Some are specific only to specific types of cells in a small part of the body.

lymphomas.org.uk/about-lymp...

lymphoma.org/site/pp.asp?c=...

So I'm pessimistic about published links, but hopeful that with all the new genetic tools available, scientists can prove things more easily.

[hubbell]

I got a puff back spraying Lysol in bathroom. I then spent 3 days in ICU and

8 more days with pneumonia. Hubbell

[ML1954]

I used to work in the automotive industry spray painting cars prior to proper safety regulations being passed in Ontario Canada. Back in the day you were given a paper mask to wear in the spray booth and today you suit up with an enclosed air flow mask. A recent study has suggested there is a direct link to automotive paint and CLL. The culprit is benzene which is found in automotive paint. I personally know of four people that have CLL that I worked with in the industry. There are many Vietnam veterans with CLL and this is linked to Agent Orange which has Benzene in it. A further study shows that in the early sixty's students were hired to work in Northern Ontario by the forestry industry. They held balloons as the crop dusters sprayed the area the student identified as requiring attention. They were spraying a chemical with Benzene and today many of those same people have CLL or they have passed on. I have read everything on I can find on CLL since being diagnosed in 2011, and there are numerous reports on CLL in the carpentry industry as well.

[Cllcanada Top Poster CURE Hero in reply to ML1954]

Ontario used a mixture of two chemicals — 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T — during the 1950s, ‘60s and '70s to control growth along provincial highways and transmission lines and on vast tracts of Crown land.

CN Rail used it on train tracks... Ontario Hydro used it on right of ways...

cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/...

CFB Gagetown has the only compensation to date...

If they wait long enough the problem will go away... ☹️

[splashsplash]

A causal link was proved in court in USA with Pentachlorophenol organophosphate and CLL in cases of workers in wood factories.

The trouble with trying to prove these things is the time from exposure to Pentachlorophenol and dx of CLL is between 14 and 17 years later.