A cancer mortality study in Bombay-based atomic energy community: 1975-1987

Cancer deaths recorded by the centralised health services of the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) among its employees and their families stationed in Bombay during 1975-1987 have been analysed. Expected number of deaths due to cancer in the study group has been estimated by using the age-sex-specific cancer death rates reported for Bombay resident population for the year 1983. The size of the database for the entire DAE community is about 702,000 person years and the number of cancer deaths observed in 154. Analysis has been done separately for employees and their families, individually for important groups of cancer sites such as respiratory organs, digestive organs, breast, genito-urinary organs and lymphatic and haematopoietic systems. The standardised mortality ratios are generally lower than 100, which may partly be due to the 'healthy worker effect' in the DAE community and partly because of its differences in the social class distribution and the concomitant differences in lifestyle with respect to the comparison group of Bombay city.