1. The MOBI-Kids Study Protocol: Challenges in Assessing Childhood and Adolescent Exposure to Electromagnetic Fields from Wireless Telecommunication Technologies and Possible Association with Brain Tumor Risk
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Sadetzki, Siegal, Langer, Chelsea Eastman, Bruchim, Revital, Kundi, Michael, Merletti, Franco, Vermeulen, Roel, Kromhout, Hans, Lee, Ae-Kyoung, Maslanyj, Myron, Sim, Malcolm R, Taki, Masao, Wiart, Joe, Armstrong, Bruce, Milne, Elizabeth, Benke, Geza, Schattner, Rosa, Hutter, Hans-Peter, Woehrer, Adelheid, Krewski, Daniel, Mohipp, Charmaine, Momoli, Franco, Ritvo, Paul, Spinelli, John, Lacour, Brigitte, Delmas, Dominique, Remen, Thomas, Radon, Katja, Weinmann, Tobias, Klostermann, Swaantje, Heinrich, Sabine, Petridou, Eleni, Bouka, Evdoxia, Panagopoulou, Paraskevi, Dikshit, Rajesh, Nagrani, Rajini, Even-Nir, Hadas, Chetrit, Angela, Maule, Milena, Migliore, Enrica, Filippini, Graziella, Miligi, Lucia, Mattioli, Stefano, Yamaguchi, Naohito, Kojimahara, Noriko, Ha, Mina, Choi, Kyung-Hwa, Mannetje, Andrea 't, Eng, Amanda, Woodward, Alistair, Carretero, Gema, Alguacil, Juan, Aragones, Nuria, Suare-Varela, Maria Morales, Goedhart, Geertje, Schouten-van Meeteren, A Antoinette Y N, Reedijk, A Ardine M J, Cardis, Elisabeth, Goedhart - de Wolf, Geertje, LS IRAS EEPI EXAS (Arb.hyg+bl.st.kar.), LS IRAS EEPI GRA (Gezh.risico-analyse), Sub IRAS EEPI Algemeen, Risk Assessment of Toxic and Immunomodulatory Agents, IRAS RATIA2, IRAS RATIA-SIB, LS IRAS EEPI EXAS (Arb.hyg+bl.st.kar.), LS IRAS EEPI GRA (Gezh.risico-analyse), Sub IRAS EEPI Algemeen, Risk Assessment of Toxic and Immunomodulatory Agents, IRAS RATIA2, IRAS RATIA-SIB, CCA -Cancer Center Amsterdam, APH - Amsterdam Public Health, Paediatric Oncology, Unión Europea. Comisión Europea. 7 Programa Marco, Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (España), National Health and Medical Research Council (Australia), Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research (Austria), Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association, French Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health & Safety (Francia), French National Cancer Institute, Fundación Pfizer, Ligue Nationale Contre le Cancer (Francia), Federal Office for Radiation Protection (Alemania), National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (Grecia), General Secretariat for Research and Technology (Grecia), Board of Research in Nuclear Sciences (India), Ministero della Salute (Italia), Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (Japón), Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning (Korea), Ministry of Science (Korea), Cure Kids, Health Research Council of New Zealand, Instituto de Salud Carlos III, Regional Government of Andalusia (España), Generalitat Valenciana (España), Netherlands Organisation for Health Research and Development, ODAS foundation, Sadetzki, Siegal, Langer, Chelsea Eastman, Bruchim, Revital, Kundi, Michael, Merletti, Franco, Vermeulen, Roel, Kromhout, Han, Lee, Ae-Kyoung, Maslanyj, Myron, Sim, Malcolm R, Taki, Masao, Wiart, Joe, Armstrong, Bruce, Milne, Elizabeth, Benke, Geza, Schattner, Rosa, Hutter, Hans-Peter, Woehrer, Adelheid, Krewski, Daniel, Mohipp, Charmaine, Momoli, Franco, Ritvo, Paul, Spinelli, John, Lacour, Brigitte, Delmas, Dominique, Remen, Thoma, Radon, Katja, Weinmann, Tobia, Klostermann, Swaantje, Heinrich, Sabine, Petridou, Eleni, Bouka, Evdoxia, Panagopoulou, Paraskevi, Dikshit, Rajesh, Nagrani, Rajini, Even-Nir, Hada, Chetrit, Angela, Maule, Milena, Migliore, Enrica, Filippini, Graziella, Miligi, Lucia, Mattioli, Stefano, Yamaguchi, Naohito, Kojimahara, Noriko, Ha, Mina, Choi, Kyung-Hwa, Mannetje, Andrea 't, Eng, Amanda, Woodward, Alistair, Carretero, Gema, Alguacil, Juan, Aragones, Nuria, Suare-Varela, Maria Morale, Goedhart, Geertje, Schouten-van Meeteren, A Antoinette Y N, Reedijk, A Ardine M J, and Cardis, Elisabeth
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ELF–EMF ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Population ,Internet privacy ,Brain tumor ,Socio-culturale ,computer.software_genre ,Adolescents ,Brain tumors ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,Economica ,Methods Article ,medicine ,Wireless ,Mobile phones ,030212 general & internal medicine ,education ,Association (psychology) ,Children ,media_common ,Tumors ,Selection bias ,Protocol (science) ,education.field_of_study ,business.industry ,lcsh:Public aspects of medicine ,Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health ,ELF-EMF ,Ambientale ,Tumors en els infants ,lcsh:RA1-1270 ,medicine.disease ,Telèfon mòbil i adolescents ,3. Good health ,Cervell Localització de funcions ,Mobile phone ,Telèfon mòbil ,030220 oncology & carcinogenesis ,adolescent ,Mobile telephony ,Data mining ,Public Health ,RF-EMF ,business ,computer ,brain tumor - Abstract
The rapid increase in mobile phone use in young people has generated concern about possible health effects of exposure to radiofrequency (RF) and extremely low frequency (ELF) electromagnetic fields (EMF). MOBI-Kids, a multinational case–control study, investigates the potential effects of childhood and adolescent exposure to EMF from mobile communications technologies on brain tumor risk in 14 countries. The study, which aims to include approximately 1,000 brain tumor cases aged 10–24 years and two individually matched controls for each case, follows a common protocol and builds upon the methodological experience of the INTERPHONE study. The design and conduct of a study on EMF exposure and brain tumor risk in young people in a large number of countries is complex and poses methodological challenges.This manuscript discusses the design of MOBI-Kids and describes the challenges and approaches chosen to address them, including: (1) the choice of controls operated for suspected appendicitis, to reduce potential selection bias related to lowresponse rates among population controls; (2) investigating a young study population spanning a relatively wide age range; (3) conducting a large, multinational epidemiological study, while adhering to increasingly stricter ethics requirements; (4) investigating a rare and potentially fatal disease; and (5) assessing exposure to EMF from communication technologies. Our experience in thus far developing and implementing the study protocol indicates that MOBI-Kids is feasible and will generate results that will contribute to the understanding of potential brain tumor risks associated with use of mobile phones and other wireless communications technologies among young people., We would like to thank all of the research assistants and interviewers in the study centers for their enormous efforts to ensure the research leading to these results has received funding from by the European Community's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under grant agreement number 22687 3 the MOBI-Kids project. International coordination of the project is partly supported by a grant from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (MICCIN). Australia: Australian participation in MOBI-Kids is supported by the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council with a five-year research grant (grant number: 546130 and Chief Investigators are: Malcolm R. Sim, Bruce Armstrong, Elizabeth Milne, and Geza Benke). Austria: Austrian participation in MOBI-Kids is partly supported by a grant from the Ministry of Science. Canada: Canadian participation in MOBI-Kids is supported by a university industry partnership grant from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), with the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association (CWTA) serving as the industrial partner. CWTA provides technical information on wireless telecommunications in Canada and facilitates access to billing records from Canadian network operators, but has no involvement in the design, conduct, analysis, or interpretation of the MOBI-KIDS study. Health Canada has also provided financial support to facilitate coordination between Canadian and international MOBI-Kids investigators. Daniel Krewski is the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Chair in Risk Science at the University of Ottawa. France: this project received funds from the French National Agency for Sanitary Safety of Food, Environment and Labour (ANSES, contract FSRF 2008-3), French National Cancer Institute (INCa), Pfizer Foundation and League against cancer. Germany: the German branch of MOBI-Kids is supported by the Federal Office for Radiation Protection. Greece: Greek participation is partially supported by ELKE (Special Account for Research Grants of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens) and GGET (General Secretariat for Research and Technology). India: MOBI-Kids India is supported by the Board of Research in Nuclear Sciences (BRNS). Italy: Ministry of Health RF-2009-1546284. Japan: Japanese participation in MOBI-Kids is supported by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications. Korea: MOBI-Kids Korea is financially supported by the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning (MSIP), Korea in the ICT R&D Program. New Zealand: MOBI-Kids New Zealand is supported by grants from Cure Kids New Zealand and the New Zealand Health Research Council. Spain: Spanish participation is partially supported by the Spanish Health Research Fund (FIS PI10/02981), the Andalusian Consejeria de Salud (PI-0317/2010) and Conselleria de Sanitat, Generalitat Valenciana under grant number 025/2010. The Netherlands: Dutch participation in MOBI-KIDS is partly supported by The Netherlands Organisation for Health Research and Development (ZonMw) within the program Electromagnetic Fields and Health Research under grant number 85800001, and by the ODAS foundation, a private foundation supporting activities in the field of pediatric oncology and visual disabilities.
- Published
- 2014
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