title: Occupational asthma: risk factors, diagnosis and preventive measures.
abstract: In adulthood, new or recurrent asthma is caused by work in approximately 10% of cases. The term occupational asthma is reserved for those cases arising from respiratory hypersensitivity to a specific workplace agent; in others (work-exacerbated asthma) the mechanism is of nonspecific airway irritation on a background of bronchial hyper-reactivity. Some 300 workplace agents are capable of inducing asthma de novo; fortunately, most cases are attributed to a much smaller number to which exposure occurs in a few high-risk occupations. Exposure level is the most important remediable risk factor; the factors governing individual susceptibility are poorly understood. Diagnosis is generally straightforward. Management is rarely pharmacologic and often difficult since the diagnosis incurs important employment and other social consequences.
authors.affiliation: Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Imperial College, London, UK. p.cullinan@imperial.ac.uk
authors.forename: Paul
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Cullinan