Asbestos Related Diseases

Many people exposed very heavily to asbestos will not develop any asbestos-related disease at all. However, there are several different diseases caused by asbestos.  

 

 

 

They often appear many years after someone was exposed to asbestos. This is often referred to as the “latency period” and can be anything from 10 to 60 years.  

 

Mesothelioma is a rapidly fatal and painful cancer of the lining of the lung (pleura), the abdomen (peritoneum), or heart (pericardium).. The only known cause is exposure to asbestos. It  is often confused with lung cancer and until the 1960s was unrecognised. More than 10 times as many deaths are due to pleural mesothelioma as to peritoneal mesothelioma. Some people develop both. 

 

A typical symptom of mesothelioma is breathlessness caused by the build up of fluid around the lungs. Unfortunately there is no known cure for mesothelioma although new treatments are being pioneered.

 

Asbestosis is a disabling and eventually fatal scarring of the lungs, causing severe breathlessness and chest pains. The destructive effects of asbestos cause the slow replacement of healthy lung tissue, responsible for the exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide, by fibrous or scar tissue, which cannot ‘breathe’.

 

Lungs have a natural reserve capacity that means the disease can develop over many years without any symptoms showing. By then the damage is well and truly advanced. The victim will be short of breath, unable to walk very far, will have coughing, general weakness and chest pain. The damaged lungs strain the heart and can lead to congestive heart failure. X-rays detect the damage at an early stage: a routine medical examination will not.  

 

Serious asbestosis is thought only to occur when a person has had very heavy past exposure to asbestos.

 

Lung Cancer can be caused by several factors (such as smoking). It can also be caused by asbestos exposure alone, or by a combination of asbestos exposure and smoking. It is a painful and nearly always fatal disease. In the UK around 38,000 people a year die from lung cancer, the most common cancer in men, and second most common in women. Smoking is assumed to be the main cause, but some 6,000 lung cancers a year may be wholly or partly caused by previous asbestos exposure, at a very conservative estimate. HSE have said there are at least 2 lung cancers caused by asbestos for every mesothelioma, others say there could be many more. 

 

Pleural Thickening is where the lining of the lung thickens as a reaction to asbestos fibres in the lungs. If the thickening is very severe it can restrict breathing. The lung walls thicken because of the scarring caused by asbestos. This is seen on X-ray examination. Extensive thickening may cause severe shortness of breath. It can occur on one side of the lungs, or both sides (known as bilateral) or it can be described as widespread (known as diffuse). 

 

Pleural Plaques are localised areas of pleural thickening or scarring. In most cases they do not cause disability or symptoms. They also show up on X-rays as  dense bands of scar tissue, different from pleural thickening. Plaques are usually seen on both sides of the lungs. People with pleural plaques may run an increased risk of developing lung cancer. The lung cancer rate in a group of shipyard workers with plaques was double that of shipyard workers without. As a marker of past asbestos exposure they can cause the sufferer considerable anxiety.

 

Other types of cancers caused by asbestos

In 1982 the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) said there is clear causal relationship to gastrointestinal cancers and cancers of the larynx in workers exposed to the three main types of asbestos.

 

If you have been diagnosed with an asbestos related disease, it is important to know which one you have. If you are unsure, consult your GP.