title: Asbestos-related pleural thickenings in Japanese sake brewers.
abstract: Asbestos was long used as an additive material for the filtration of many kinds of alcoholic beverages. There has been, however, only one case report of a distiller in Italy showing pleural thickenings and lung parenchymal fibrosis due to exposure to asbestos. We report a retired Japanese sake brewer who showed bilateral calcified pleural plaques on chest X-ray films. X-ray diffraction analysis and energy disperse X-ray microanalysis demonstrated the additive material used for sake filtration to be almost pure chrysotile. Furthermore, 17 cases showing probably asbestos-related pleural thickenings were found on examination of 235 chest X-ray films of male workers at different sake breweries. These findings indicate that Japanese sake brewers should be listed as workers at possible risk of asbestos-related health problems.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pulmonary Mediciné, Kanazawa Medical University, Ishikawa, Japan.
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Horii
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Nagasaka
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Yamada
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000434:Alcoholic Beverages / Q000009:adverse effects*; D001194:Asbestos / Q000009:adverse effects*; D017632:Asbestos, Serpentine; D001195:Asbestosis / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000473:pathology; D001706:Biopsy; D005374:Filtration; D006801:Humans; D007564:Japan; D008168:Lung / Q000473:pathology; D008297:Male; D008855:Microscopy, Electron, Scanning; D016273:Occupational Exposure / Q000009:adverse effects*; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed
chemical_list: D017632:Asbestos, Serpentine; D001194:Asbestos