title: Industrial population survey on the importance of chronic bronchitis and asthma-like symptoms in airflow obstruction.
abstract: The report includes a description of the prevalence of chronic bronchitis and asthma-like symptoms in the industrial population in an attempt to study the relationship between these two syndromes and airflow obstruction. The data were derived from the cross-sectional study performed in 4,717 male workers employed in the chemical industrial complex situated near Cracow, Poland. It was observed that the prevalence of asthma-like symptoms in the population under study was unexpectedly higher than that of chronic bronchitis. The results confirmed that there was no cause-effect relationship between productive cough and airflow obstruction but it was shown that asthma-like syndrome increased the risk of airflow obstruction. The supposed strong biologic impact of asthma-like symptoms on airflow obstruction should draw an attention to this syndrome in the occupational epidemiology of chronic chest diseases.
mesh_terms: D001249:Asthma / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology*; D001991:Bronchitis / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology*; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005541:Forced Expiratory Volume; D006801:Humans; D008173:Lung Diseases, Obstructive / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology*; D008297:Male; D009784:Occupational Diseases / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology*; D011044:Poland; D012306:Risk; D012907:Smoking; D013147:Spirometry