Quarter 3: July 1, 2021 – September 30, 2021

PA Health and Environment Studies: Study 1 (Childhood cancer case-control study)

Recently Completed

  • We received protected access approval from the Pennsylvania Department of Health (PADOH) and have obtained information on the childhood cancer cases from the PADOH Bureau of Vital Statistics Cancer Registry and Birth Records.
  • We have begun our initial mailing process and have contacted approximately 100 eligible case parents for enrollment; awaiting responses regarding their interest to participate.
  • We have uploaded our questionnaire onto the Qualtrics platform and conducted our interviewer orientation session. We plan to begin interviews by October 6, 2021.
  • We held our first meeting with our External Advisory Board in August 2021. One Chair and two Co-Chairs were elected to lead these meetings going forward.

In Progress

  • We will identify age-, gender-, and race-matched controls within the study area using birth records from the PADOH Bureau of Vital Statistics Birth Records and plan to begin contacting them shortly.
  • We will begin telephone interviews with case parents in October 2021.
  • We will have our next quarterly meeting with our External Advisory Board between late October and mid-November 2021.

Challenges/Solutions

  • The project staff now work in a hybrid model of in-person and remote workspaces. This allows for increased collaboration and for the mailings to be assembled and disseminated more effectively.

PA Health and Environment Studies: Study 2 (Asthma and birth cohort studies)

Recently Completed

  • Birth outcomes: we have our study cohort file of approximately 194,000 births from January 2010 to December 2020.
  • Asthma: we received our study cohort file of approximately 120,000 asthma cases from January 2011 to April 2021.
  • Exposure: We have obtained all data required to calculate unconventional natural gas development well activity metrics.

In Progress

  • We are performing quality assurance checks and descriptive analyses for both birth outcomes and asthma cohort files.
  • We are combining environmental and census data so that we can link it to residential location. This information will be used to evaluate residential-level exposures potentially related to unconventional natural gas activities and other industries in the eight-county study area (Allegheny, Armstrong, Beaver, Butler, Fayette, Greene, Washington and Westmoreland Counties).

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