SMOKING OF HAND-ROLLED CIGARETTES AS A RISK FACTOR FOR SMALL-CELL LUNG-CANCER IN MEN - A CASE-CONTROL STUDY FROM URUGUAY

During the time period January 1989-December 1992, a case-control stud y involving 476 cases of lung cancer and 561 controls was carried out at the Institute Nacional de Oncologia, Montevideo, Uruguay, in order to analyze the patterns of risk of the different cell types of lung ca ncer, associated with smoking manufactured and hand-rolled cigarettes. Lifelong smokers of hand-rolled cigarettes displayed a non-significan t 30% increased risk, compared with smokers of commercial cigarettes, for all types of lung cancer combined. The analysis for cell-type disc losed a fourfold increase in the risk of small cell lung carcinoma ass ociated with lifelong smoking of hand-rolled products. The possibiliti es of a chance finding and of misclassification of the disease appears to be an unlikely explanation of this strong and rather specific asso ciation.