Hemoblastoses in offspring of radiation-hazardous industries workers

Malignant tumors of hematopoietic and lymphoid tissues in children have polyetiologic nature, including some contribution of parents’ exposure to radiation. The causal relationships between parental chronic preconceptive external gamma-irradiation and hematological malignancies in their children have been studied. Retrospective epidemiological study based on a “nested case-control approach” using matching method was carried out in the cohort of Ozyorsk pediatric population. “Case” is defined as a child under 15 years old with diagnosed hemoblastosis. The “control” group is the one without such a diagnosis. The controls were selected from the same Ozyorsk children’s cohort by matching cases on sex, birth year and parents’ age at children’s birth. Subgroups of children who are offspring of those occupationally exposed are distinguished. Calculation odds ratio (OR) with 95 % confidence interval (CI) is performed. There were 51 children under 15 years age diagnosed with hemoblastosis in Ozyorsk within 1949-2009. The control group included 197 health children. 29.4 % (15 children) in the study group were offspring of people who had accumulated doses of preconceptive exposure, whereas in the control group the indicator is 43.1 % (85 children). The total doses of external gamma radiation on the parent’s gonad varied widely (2.1-3397.3 mGy in the study group and 0.5-2899.3 mGy in the control group). The average age of leukemia contraction was 6 years without regard to sex. Acute leukemia was a major contributor to the hemoblastosis structure (66.7 % of all cases). Analysis of the data showed no statistical relationship between preconceptional prolonged external gamma-radiation exposure in parents and oncohematological pathology in their offspring. OR indicator amounted 0.55 (0.28-1.07), among boys - 0.48 (0.19-1.22), among girls - 0.64 (0.25-1.65).