TY - THES ID - 135889800 TI - Pilot study: Occupational silica exposure in patients suffering from rheumatoid arthritis AU - Celen, Hannelore AU - De Langhe, Ellen AU - Verschueren, Patrick AU - KU Leuven. Faculteit Geneeskunde. Opleiding Master in de specialistische geneeskunde (uitdovend programma vanaf 2019-2020) (Leuven) PY - 2021 PB - Leuven KU Leuven. Faculteit Geneeskunde DB - UniCat UR - https://www.unicat.be/uniCat?func=search&query=sysid:135889800 AB - Introduction: For decades, exposure to respirable crystalline silica (RCS) has been linked to systemic sclerosis (SSc), rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). Objectives: This thesis is a pilot project in RA patients to test whether it is possible to correctly assign occupational exposure to RCS using a questionnaire and a job exposure matrix (JEM) linked to ISCO-68 job codes. Methods: We created an occupational history questionnaire. We evaluated the response rate of the patients and a control group of family members. We evaluated the performance of the questionnaire by estimating the agreement of reported job years, ISCO-68 job codes, RCS exposure and cumulative RCS exposure between a telephone interview and a questionnaire (same observer) and between two different observers based on the same questionnaire. Results: The response rate of the patients was 77 % but the response rate of the controls was only 6.75%. The agreement of reported working years, ISCO-68 job codes and RCS exposure between the telephone interview and the questionnaire was satisfying and the positive correlation between estimated cumulative RCS exposure based on the telephone interview and the questionnaire was statistically significant. The agreement of reported working years, ISCO-68 job codes and RCS exposure between two different observers was also satisfying and the positive correlation between cumulative RCS exposure estimated by two different observers based on the same questionnaire was statistically significant too. Conclusion: We conclude that a questionnaire can be used to determine RCS exposure based on a JEM linked to ISCO-68 job codes. ER -