TLDR
Flight attendants may have a higher chance of dying from a rare nerve disease called ALS, but more research is needed to know for sure.
Summary
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1 Study Aim
The study set out to find out if former US flight attendants have a higher risk of dying from neurodegenerative diseases (diseases that affect the brain and nerves over time), especially amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), possibly due to exposure to chemical contaminants in airplane cabin air. The study wanted to see if working as a flight attendant is linked to more deaths from certain brain and nerve diseases.
2 Study Design
Researchers followed a group of 11,311 former Pan American World Airways flight attendants who worked at least one year after 1953. They tracked deaths in this group up to 2007 and compared the number of deaths from neurodegenerative diseases to what would be expected in the general US population. The main method used was life table analysis, which calculates standardized mortality ratios (SMRs) to see if deaths from these diseases were higher or lower than average. The study also looked at how long each person worked as a flight attendant and how much time had passed since they started the job. The study compared deaths from nerve diseases in thousands of former flight attendants to the general population over several decades.
3 Findings
The research found that deaths from ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a disease that attacks nerve cells controlling muscles) were more than twice as high among flight attendants compared to the general population, based on nine observed deaths. Most of these deaths happened more than 30 years after starting work as a flight attendant. There was no clear link between how long someone worked and their risk of ALS. Deaths from other neurodegenerative diseases, like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, were not higher than expected. The authors caution that the small number of ALS deaths and the use of death records (which may miss some cases) limit the strength of their conclusions. They recommend more research, especially studies that can better measure exposure to chemicals in cabin air and track neurological health over time. The study found more deaths from ALS in flight attendants than expected, but not for other brain diseases, and suggests more research is needed.