Smoking promotes insidious and chronic farmer's lung disease, and deteriorates the clinical outcome.

Although the prevalence of serum precipitating antibodies for farmer's lung disease (FLD) is lower in smokers than in nonsmokers and FLD predominates in nonsmokers, the affects of smoking on the clinical course of the disease is not known. We compared the clinical findings and the prognosis between 12 smokers (SM-FLD) and 31 non-smokers with FLD (NS-FLD). There was no difference in age, sex, working years on farm, clinical symptoms, laboratory findings, radiographic findings, between the two groups. However, for the type of onset on the first visit for FLD, "acute single episode" type was less common, and "recurrent" and "insidious onset" types were more common in SM-FLD than in NS-FLD (8.3 vs 58.1, 91.7 vs 41.9%, respectively, p < 0.05). Although working status and mask wearing status were not significantly different between the two groups after the diagnosis of FLD, patients with symptoms and/or radiographic abnormalities of FLD of more than 6 months were found more frequently in SM-FLD than in NS-FLD (66.7 vs 19.4%, p < 0.005). And also SM-FLD had more recurrences of FLD than NS-FLD after the initial diagnosis of FLD (1.58 +/- 1.56 vs 0.47 +/- 1.07, p < 0.05). SM-FLD tended to have lower % VC than NS-FLD (73.6 +/- 7.4 vs 88.5 +/- 3.9%, respectively, p = 0.06). Regarding the prognosis, the 10-year survival rates were 70.7% in SM-FLD, and 91.5% in NS-FLD (p < 0.05). These results suggest that smoking may make FLD insidious and chronic, and deteriorates the clinical outcome.

Mortality due to farmer's lung in Finland.

Fatal cases of farmer's lung (FL) are rare. We found, based on death certificates, 13 cases of FL with a fatal outcome in Finland between 1980 and 1990. Compared with incidence data from the years 1980 to 1982, the mortality was estimated as 0.7 percent. On average, death occurred 8 years after the diagnosis of FL. One patient died acutely after a heavy mold exposure. The other patients had chronic disease. Among them the immediate cause of death was pneumonia in seven patients, respiratory insufficiency in four, and pneumothorax in one patient. The majority of these patients with a fatal outcome had suffered from symptoms of FL for more than 1 year before the diagnosis was established and fibrotic changes were already visible in the chest radiograph at the time of the diagnosis.

Death certification of farmer's lung and chronic airway diseases in different countries of the EEC.

An EEC Working Party has investigated death certification of respiratory disease in eight EEC countries by sending ten standard case histories to a sample of certifying doctors in each country. Results of interest to clinicians with reference to certification of farmer's lung, and of obstructive airway diseases, are presented. For a case of farmer's lung, a majority of certifying doctors in all countries certified an interstitial lung disease, but the proportion certifying farmer's lung ranged from 70% to 0% (overall 26%). Rural doctors certified farmer's lung more frequently than others only in some countries. For four cases of different types of airways disease (chronic obstructive bronchitis, emphysema or asthma) there were wide differences between countries of certification of these conditions or of unspecified chronic airways obstruction. Some countries certify more emphysema, and others, particularly younger doctors in English speaking countries, more unspecified chronic airways obstruction. There are also large differences in the certification of asthma. The differences are presumed to be attributable to differences of medical education. Epidemiological studies and patient care might be helped by more uniformity of diagnostic criteria within the EEC.

Feed-associated respiratory illness in farmers.

A variety of respiratory hazards are present in the farm environment. Disorders such as Silo Filler's Disease and Farmer's Lung Disease have been detailed in the literature. A retrospective study of hospital visits for farm-associated lung injury in rural Otsego County, New York during an 11-yr period is reported herein. Twenty-two males and 1 female experienced a total of 26 episodes of illness. Eighty-four percent of the episodes occurred between July 1 and October 31. Four of the 23 individuals died, 2 acutely and 2 after a slowly progressive, debilitating disease. One patient died of suffocation in a silo; 2 patients had Silo Filler's Disease, 1 dying acutely. Of 6 patients with Farmer's Lung Disease, 2 died of progressive fibrosis. The remaining 14 patients suffered an acute febrile illness typified by short duration, clear chest radiograph, and negative serologies. We refer to this as "Silo Unloader's Syndrome" and conclude that it is a more common occurrence in the farm environment than some of the more known disorders. This study demonstrates that occupational lung injury is a problem affecting a young (average age 36 yr) vigorous population with potentially fatal consequences.