National Academies Press: OpenBook

The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans (2008)

Chapter: 5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model

« Previous: 4 Data for Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 84
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 85
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 86
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 87
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 88
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 89
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 90
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 91
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 92
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 93
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 94
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 95
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 96
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 97
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 98
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 99
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 100
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 101
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 102
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 103
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 104
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 105
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 106
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 107
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 108
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 109
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 110
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 111
Suggested Citation:"5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model." Institute of Medicine. 2008. The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/12059.
×
Page 112

Below is the uncorrected machine-read text of this chapter, intended to provide our own search engines and external engines with highly rich, chapter-representative searchable text of each book. Because it is UNCORRECTED material, please consider the following text as a useful but insufficient proxy for the authoritative book pages.

5 Recommendations Regarding Epidemiologic Studies Using the Exposure Assessment Model W ith this chapter the committee addresses the central question put to it by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA): What are the best ways to use the Stellman team’s herbicide exposure assessment model? The committee has concluded that epidemiologic studies applying the exposure assessment model should be considered, and in this chapter it discusses the potential contributions of and pitfalls in conducting such s ­ tudies. The chapter discusses design and statistical considerations for ­studies, including the selection of health outcomes, potential study populations, and other criteria for optimal use of the model. Should STUDIES be done USING THE STELLMAN TEAM’S MODEL? The committee carefully considered the question of whether, given the shortcomings of the model in its current form and its inherent limitations even with further refinements, it holds promise for generating informative epidemiologic studies of herbicides and health among Vietnam veterans. The committee concluded that the answer is yes. It reached this decision based on two key considerations: (1) The exposure assessment model is applicable to the population of ultimate interest, namely Vietnam veterans; and (2) most previous studies of this population have been so severely lim- ited with respect to exposure assessment that a more accurate yet imperfect method would advance the current understanding of whether herbicide exposure is associated with adverse health outcomes among Vietnam vet- 84

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 85 erans. We recognize the logistical challenges to be faced in obtaining the needed model inputs (troop locations, unit membership), but based on ongoing and completed activities, these challenges appear to be surmount- able. At the same time, while we appreciate the potential contributions from applying the model, we also believe that the best use of the model requires that its limitations be understood and considered when making decisions about the conduct of epidemiologic studies and particularly in interpreting the results of those studies. Contributions and Pitfalls Of Studies Using the Model Studying the Population of Interest Efforts to determine whether herbicide exposure among Vietnam veterans is associated with adverse health outcomes follow one of two approaches: (1) information from other populations, such as pesticide applicators or chemical production workers, is extrapolated to the experi- ence of Vietnam veterans, an approach that has the advantage of being grounded in information about higher exposures that are more accurately characterized; or (2) studies are conducted among the Vietnam veterans themselves. The quality of the data and the statistical power of the first group of studies have been superior and will likely continue to generate more accurate information on herbicide exposure and health in general, particularly for dioxin, but the disadvantage of this approach is that there is an inevitable loss of information value when results are extrapolated from one population to another. Furthermore, there is an inherent value in examining the issue of health effects of herbicide exposure in the Vietnam veterans themselves. The q ­ uestion posed by the VA is not the global one, “Is herbicide exposure asso- ciated with adverse health outcomes?”, but rather the narrow one, “Did herbicide exposure affect the health of Vietnam veterans?” Because the herbicide exposures experienced by most Vietnam veterans are imperfectly characterized and presumably low compared with occupationally exposed populations, studies on these veterans can make only limited contributions to answering global questions regarding herbicides and health. However, studies on veterans have much greater potential than other studies to answer the narrower question about their exposure and their health. No other group has the confluence of exposures and exposure circumstances experienced by the Vietnam veterans, so given an adequate tool, it is impor- tant to ask the question in this group.

86 PROXIMITY-BASED HERBICIDE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT Improvement in Estimation of Exposure to Herbicides Even with the advantage of studying exposure and health in the popula- tion of interest—Vietnam veterans—the Stellman team’s herbicide exposure assessment model must offer incremental improvement over the methods of exposure assessment used in previous epidemiologic studies of Vietnam veterans if it is to be valuable. The committee concluded that it does offer such improvement. As noted in Chapter 3, many of the studies carried out in Vietnam veterans have relied on “service in Vietnam” as the exposure of interest in examining health outcomes. That approach in effect classifies all those who served in Vietnam as having been exposed to herbicides. Such studies have been able to make only limited contributions to the question of the health effects of exposure to herbicides in Vietnam because many of those considered “exposed” are likely to have had little or no contact with herbicides. Accurate exposure classification is frequently the limiting factor in epidemiologic studies, particularly regarding environmental exposures. In simple terms, errors are introduced when those who are truly exposed are misidentified as unexposed (false negatives) and when those who are truly unexposed are misidentified as exposed (false positives). The shortcomings of an exposure assignment are sometimes explicit, as when service in Viet- nam is used to define “exposure to herbicides” despite the certainty that many false positives will occur (unexposed veterans classified as exposed). In general, such errors, if independent of health outcomes, will tend to dilute any true associations between exposure and health. This will both bias measures of relative risk to be closer to the null value of 1.0 (i.e., no association) and increase the relative variance of estimated effects. Although the actual proportion of Vietnam veterans who had potential for meaningful herbicide exposure is not known, given the temporal and geographic distribution of spraying, it seems likely that exposure was not universal or equal for all those who served. For instance, the Ranch Hand and Army Chemical Corps veterans, who handled the herbicides and pre- sumably had higher exposures on average than other troops, can be studied with confidence as being exposed populations. But the challenge of address- ing the broader population of Vietnam veterans remains. The Stellman team’s model offers the possibility of establishing a gradient of exposure opportunity among the larger population of veterans. In many instances requiring historical estimation of exposure, it is not possible to generate accurate, quantitative indices, and epidemiologists instead pursue a more modest goal of rank-ordering levels or probabilities of exposure. That is, without being able to specify a quantity of exposure, it is possible to place individuals into groups that have higher and lower levels or probabilities of exposure and examine patterns of health across

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 87 those groups to determine whether the more highly exposed have excess risk of adverse health events. Such studies can identify associations even if they are unable to provide information on quantitative dose-response relationships. The exposure assessment hierarchy discussed in Chapter 3 helps to illustrate both the potential contributions and the limitations of the model’s exposure metrics. It is very likely that exposure metrics based on proxim- ity to herbicide spraying provide a better estimate of exposure than does simple presence in Vietnam during certain years. The metrics are also likely to be an improvement over self-reported exposure to herbicides because individuals are unlikely to know when or if an area was sprayed before they arrived and could have mistaken insecticide spraying for herbicide spraying. Approximating target tissue doses in quantitative terms would be an ideal exposure measure, but it is unattainable. Thus, relative to an ideal, the Stellman team’s herbicide assessment model is inherently limited, and even with major refinements will not approximate exposure classifica- tion based on precise individual doses. Still, there is incremental benefit in moving from poor to somewhat better approaches. As a simple illustration of this point, consider the hypothetical results of a study that considers all veterans as exposed versus a study that cor- rectly identifies some fraction of them as not exposed. For purposes of the example, assume that both exposure and disease are classified simply as either occurring or not occurring, and assume a true relative risk of 1.4. Our estimates of relative risk are accurate only if the classification of expo- sure is 100 percent accurate—that is, if all those who were presumed to be exposed truly were exposed, and all those presumed not to be exposed truly were not. With these assumptions, the value of correctly identifying at least some veterans as not exposed becomes clear: If all of those who served in Vietnam are classified as exposed (as many studies have done) when in truth only 20 percent of the troops who served were exposed, the relative risk would be calculated to be only 1.08—far less than the actual value. If exposure classification could be improved such that 80 percent of those designated as exposed actually were exposed (e.g., by applying an expo- sure classification model that more effectively isolates the troops who had potential herbicide exposure) and no one who was exposed was classified as not exposed (a false negative), the relative risk would be calculated as 1.32, which is much closer to the true value in this highly simplified example. Although these results are hypothetical, they illustrate the principle that when the true risk among those exposed is only modestly increased, mis­ classification may well hinder identification of elevated risks. Improvements in estimation, even with error still present, would move the observed results in the direction of the value that would be obtained with no mis­classification and be more likely to identify any associations between herbicide exposure

88 PROXIMITY-BASED HERBICIDE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT and health that are truly present. By converting a dichotomous classifica- tion of exposure (yes/no) into an exposure opportunity score, even with measurement error, there are further gains in accuracy and statistical power. We expect that the exposure opportunity score, even if imprecise, will ­better identify the highly exposed individuals, improving the specificity of the exposure assignment and therefore reducing the exposure misclassification bias. As noted above, improvements in specificity have the largest effect on reducing misclassification and attenuation of the relative risk (Flegal et al., 1986). Although application of the Stellman team’s model to estimate expo- sure can be expected to reduce some aspects of exposure misclassifica- tion, others will inevitably remain. It is possible that the Stellman team’s exposure metrics and software tool could be improved with the incorpo- ration of more detailed chemical fate and transport models. But moving from simple proximity to consideration of fate and transport will involve incorporating either more detailed assumptions or additional data regard- ing spray patterns, drift, meteorology, and ground cover, among others. Furthermore, the current model does not account for individual-level f ­ actors such as contact with contaminated plants and soil or consumption of tainted food or water, which may be an additional source of error in the exposure estimate. However, unlike the factors related to the flight path, which affect a whole unit’s potential exposure, these individual-level f ­ actors influence how individual-level exposure is distributed around a group (unit) average. Therefore, omitting them should cause little or no bias, but it will generally tend to increase the confidence limits around the exposure estimates. In the absence of individual-level data on behavior or suspected systematic variations in individual behavior between locations or units, any additional modeling of exposure beyond fate and transport, such as different routes of exposure, is unlikely to appreciably change the rank order of exposure estimates. The ultimate benefits of the Stellman team’s exposure metrics depend, of course, on the reliability of the infrastructure around which they are built—the data on the location histories of spraying and military units or personnel. The committee concluded that the infrastructure is sufficiently reliable to justify use of the data, as long as sources of potential exposure misclassification are recognized. In particular, the documentation of her- bicide spraying by fixed-wing aircraft appears to be more complete than that for the spraying by helicopters and ground equipment. In addition, analyses have shown high soil contamination with 2,3,7,8-tetrachloro- dibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD) at some former military bases (Dwernychuck In this context, specificity refers to how well truly unexposed people are classified as unexposed.

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 89 et al., 2002; Dwernychuck, 2005; Hatfield Consultants and Office of the National Steering Committee 33, MNRE, 2007), suggesting spills or other discharges of herbicide that would not be reflected in the spraying data. As a result, service members may have herbicide exposures that cannot be captured by the model’s exposure metrics. Another consideration is that many of the herbicides used in Vietnam, or products similar to them, were also in widespread use at lower concentrations in the United States begin- ning before the Vietnam War, so veterans may have had some exposure to them and any TCDD contaminants before or after their military service. TCDD and other dioxins have also been present in the United States since the Vietnam War as chemical contaminants or byproducts of combustion and manufacturing processes. The exposure sources that are not captured by the model would result in underestimation of herbicide exposures and the potential for false n ­ egatives—people designated as not exposed by the model who were in fact exposed to herbicides. If this exposure were randomly distributed across the study population, it would be expected to bias the relative risk toward the null, making true associations of health effects with herbicide sprayed from fixed-wing aircraft more difficult to discern. Interpretation of Studies Using the Model The committee was also concerned with how the results of studies of Vietnam veterans using the Stellman team’s model should be interpreted, given the strengths and limitations of the approach. For established associa- tions between herbicide exposure and health outcomes, finding a positive association in a study that applies this model to Vietnam veterans would provide evidence in support of the veterans having experienced health problems as a result of herbicide exposure. It would also add credibility to the ability of the model to classify exposure. On the other hand, inter- preting a study that failed to find such associations would be much more challenging. In fact, at least four interpretations would be possible: (1) an association is truly present in the population, but the model failed to cap- ture herbicide exposure with sufficient accuracy for the association to be detected; (2) study subjects were accurately assigned to exposure categories, but their herbicide exposure was at levels that are not associated with the health outcome; (3) study subjects’ exposures are associated with such small levels of risk that they are not detectable using epidemiologic methods; or (4) the presumption that herbicides truly cause the health outcome studied is in error. Note that these explanations pertain to the use of the model specifically to evaluate herbicide exposure and the health of Vietnam veterans. A sepa- rate issue is the contribution such studies might make to broader questions

90 PROXIMITY-BASED HERBICIDE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT concerning the effects of herbicides on health. In those cases where there is a sizable body of high-quality epidemiologic research based on large popu- lations with relatively high exposures, the incremental benefit of studies of herbicides and health among veterans would be small, given their relatively low and imperfectly documented herbicide exposure. Even with improve- ments in exposure assignment, their experience is less readily documented than that of some other groups that have already been studied. On the other hand, where the current body of research on specific herbicides and health outcomes is less extensive—which is often the case for health outcomes other than cancer—the application of the Stellman team’s exposure assessment model to Vietnam veterans does hold potential for advancing the larger body of knowledge concerning herbicides and health. That is, where the baseline level of information is lower, studies on Vietnam veterans may advance knowledge despite the known limitations in exposure levels and measurement. The ongoing research by the Stellman team addressing herbicides and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is one example of such a situation, as there has been a limited amount of work done on this topic to date. But any new associations observed in studies carried out using the model in Vietnam veteran populations will need to be confirmed in other herbicide-exposed populations. Applying the model to approximate TCDD exposure is especially prob- lematic. The variable (and unknown) concentrations of TCDD across her- bicide batches make even a perfectly accurate assignment of proximity to spraying of limited value as a TCDD exposure proxy. The CDC (1988, 1989) Agent Orange study, which included only 646 Vietnam veterans, all of whom served no more than 1 year in Vietnam, is the most comprehen- sive study of veterans’ serum TCDD levels performed to date. It found that serum TCDD levels in veterans who served in Vietnam were similar to those of veterans who did not serve there, but the study may not have captured a sufficient number of the most highly exposed soldiers. It is unlikely that meaningful new studies of TCDD levels in serum can be performed in the future because of the long period since the end of the war. This evidence and other studies (e.g., CDC, 1988; Mocarelli et al., 1991; Pirkle and Houk, 1992; Michalek et al., 1996; Sweeney et al., 1997–1998) suggest that the TCDD exposure of many Vietnam veterans was lower than that of other groups that have been studied epidemiologically, such as Air Force Ranch Hand personnel, herbicide production workers, or some of the residents of Seveso, Italy (e.g., those in Zone A). For this reason, studies of Vietnam veterans are not likely to contribute much to the overall knowledge of TCDD and health, regardless of how accurate the methods of exposure classification might become. In summary, epidemiologic studies that use the Stellman team’s expo- sure model have the potential to be informative about the health of Vietnam

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 91 veterans, but they should not necessarily be expected to offer additional insight into the effects of TCDD at the toxicologic level because of inherent limitations in the accuracy of individual exposure assignment. However, the committee does see a possibility that more might be learned about the long- term health effects of exposure to the other herbicides that have not been as extensively studied and that were more consistent in composition. GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS FOR CONDUCTING STUDIES To make the best use of the Stellman team’s exposure assessment model and produce meaningful epidemiologic findings for Vietnam vet- erans, ­ several issues need to be considered that bear on the feasibility of studies and the information value of their results. Representativeness of Vietnam Veterans The committee has assumed that the main purpose of conducting studies using the exposure assessment model is to learn more about if and how Vietnam veterans’ health was affected by herbicide spraying. Given that assumption, then study populations should reflect in a general way the breadth of experience of Vietnam veterans. And because the goal is to produce findings that would be applicable to all those who served, research should encompass the spectrum of experiences of potentially exposed troops. While formal random sampling is not necessary, broad represen- tation is needed. Furthermore, oversampling of those most likely to have been exposed to herbicides would be helpful in enhancing statistical power. Specific candidate populations for study are considered below. Broad Range of Health Outcomes Research addressing proximity to spraying and health outcomes should provide a comprehensive view of the health of veterans and thus address a wide range of health outcomes. Studying outcomes believed to be related to herbicide exposure is of interest, because finding such associations in the veteran population would support the supposition that their exposures were high enough to produce health effects and that the exposures were represented by the model with sufficient accuracy for those effects to be detected. Addressing a wide range of health outcomes also has advantages in terms of efficiency. Depending on the sources of health outcome informa- tion, when information on one health outcome is gathered, it may not take much additional work to gather information on other outcomes. In the most recent review by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) Com- mittee on Veterans and Agent Orange (IOM, 2007), sufficient evidence

92 PROXIMITY-BASED HERBICIDE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT for an association with exposure to herbicides has been reported for the following conditions: chloracne, chronic lymphocytic leukemia, Hodgkin’s disease, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, and soft tissue sarcoma. Limited or sug- gestive evidence of an association was reported for laryngeal cancer; ­cancer of the lung, bronchus, or trachea; prostate cancer; multiple myeloma; AL ­ amyloidosis; early-onset transient peripheral neuropathy; porphyria c ­ utanea tarda; hypertension; Type 2 diabetes mellitus; and, in the offspring of exposed people, spina bifida. Studies would also be of value for health outcomes that have even weaker evidence for an association with herbicide exposure. Among these are the health outcomes currently classified by IOM committees reviewing the literature on herbicides and health as having “inadequate or insuffi- cient evidence” to determine an association with herbicide exposure. The most recent IOM review (IOM, 2007) includes in this category numerous types of cancer as well as lupus, stroke, and movement disorders, such as Parkinson’s disease. Breast cancer is also in this category, but studying it poses special challenges because of the small number of women who served in Vietnam. In selecting health outcomes for study, researchers may want to take into account the ability of the Stellman team’s exposure assessment soft- ware to generate separate exposure metrics for each of the herbicides used in Vietnam, including the arsenical cacodylic acid of Agent Blue and picloram in Agent White. The biennial reviews carried out by IOM contain careful reviews of the toxicologic and epidemiologic literature on the herbi- cides and can offer a source of guidance on outcomes of potential interest. As noted above, the contributions that the model can make to advancing general knowledge of herbicides and health depend to a great extent on the baseline level of understanding. Therefore, research on less extensively studied herbicides and health outcomes holds more promise for advancing Conclusions from the IOM reviews of evidence concerning associations between herbicides and health outcomes fall primarily into one of three categories (IOM, 2007): (1) Sufficient evidence of an association means that a positive association has been observed in studies in which chance, bias, and confounding can be ruled out with reasonable confidence. (2) Limited or suggestive evidence of an association means that the body of evidence suggests an associa- tion, but chance, bias, or confounding cannot be confidently ruled out. (3) Inadequate or insufficient evidence to determine an association means that available studies have inconsistent findings or are of insufficient quality or statistical power to support a conclusion regarding the presence of an association. The IOM committee that conducted the most recent review of the evidence concerning herbicides and health outcomes was unable to reach consensus on the classification for breast cancer, melanoma, and ischemic heart disease (IOM, 2007). As a default, these three condi- tions were assigned to the category of “inadequate or insufficient evidence” of an association rather than to the category of “limited or suggestive evidence,” which indicates somewhat stronger support for an association.

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 93 general knowledge of the health effects of a herbicide than does additional research on topics already well studied. It may also be worthwhile to consider whether proximity to herbicide spraying can serve as a proxy for combat stress or other factors that might be relevant in studying such outcomes as suicide, posttraumatic stress dis- order, and cardiovascular disease. Completeness and Timeliness of Health Data Studying the relationship between herbicide exposure in Vietnam and health outcomes that are often not fatal, such as diabetes or prostate cancer, might be strengthened by using data on morbidity in addition to mortality data. In these cases it is important to determine health outcomes accu- rately and comprehensively both for the sake of precision (to maximize the n ­ umber of cases) and for validity (to ensure that the measures of association between herbicide exposure and health are accurate). The issue of statistical power is addressed more fully below, but to the extent that there is under- ascertainment of health outcomes in veterans, it seems likely that the degree of under-ascertainment will be unrelated to exposure opportunity scores, meaning that there will be either no bias or a bias towards the null in rela- tive measures of association. As discussed in Chapter 4, researchers will face challenges in access- ing morbidity data stemming from the dispersed nature of health care in the United States. These challenges are not unique to studies of veterans, however, and both the VA and Medicare systems are leading possibilities for consideration. With Vietnam veterans reaching older ages and their overall likelihood of health problems therefore increasing, studies should aim to ascertain health status up to recent time periods. Reanalysis of health outcome data that were collected for past studies has the appeal of being somewhat sim- pler than initiating a new study: The principal task becomes developing location histories for the study subjects whose health outcome data have already been collected. But, depending on how long ago the study was origi- nally conducted, this approach would miss the opportunity to incorporate additional, more recent data on the study population’s health experience. Statistical Power Proposed studies will need to have adequate statistical power to detect an association between health effects and exposure to herbicides in Viet- nam, if in fact one exists. Statistical power depends on several factors: the risk of error considered acceptable in concluding that no effect is present, the risk of concluding that an effect is present when it is not, the size of

94 PROXIMITY-BASED HERBICIDE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT the effect detected relative to the amount of variability in the population, and the size of the sample. The smaller the effect anticipated, the larger the sample size needed to reliably detect it. The committee expects that a very large study population (in the tens of thousands) will be needed to conduct cohort studies of health effects in relation to Vietnam veterans’ exposure to herbicide spraying, particularly for relatively rare outcomes such as soft tissue sarcoma or ALS. For cancer endpoints, where we have the most prior knowledge, three factors suggest that the magnitude of the effect (e.g., the relative risk) is likely to be small in studies of Vietnam veterans: (1) the excess of cancer was relatively small in many previous studies of more highly exposed populations, including those involved in Operation Ranch Hand and even pesticide production workers and applicators (see IOM, 2007); (2) the exposure to herbicides among the majority of Vietnam veterans is likely to be low relative to these previously studied occupational and environmental cohorts; and (3) the degree of accuracy of the model in representing differences in veterans’ exposure is uncertain. For these reasons, studies should be designed to have sufficient power to detect even modest effects. Confounding Another major consideration in designing an epidemiologic study to evaluate possible adverse health effects of herbicide exposures in Vietnam veterans is the need to control for potential confounders, such as tobacco, alcohol, or drug consumption. Some Vietnam veterans, particularly among those with posttraumatic stress disorder, are likely to have had high rates of alcohol or drug use (e.g., McFall et al., 1992). It is also possible that exposure to combat stress might be correlated with exposure to spraying operations. Confounding may be controlled by including potential confounding factors in the statistical analyses, for example, or by restricting analyses to veterans with similar potential for exposure to combat-related stress and with similar socioeconomic backgrounds (Stellman and Stellman, 2003). Analytic Approaches Researchers planning to use the Stellman team’s exposure metrics in an epidemiologic study should recognize and seek ways to mitigate the impact of the many unmeasured determinants of exposure operating at the unit level and affecting individuals within units. The model’s predictions for unit exposures are subject to error, and statistical methods to account for such limitations at the level of unit assignment and individuals within units merit further consideration and refinement. Multilevel (or hierarchical) models

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 95 would constitute one approach to incorporating measurement error into the analysis (e.g., see Dominici et al., 2000; Greenland, 2000). A different approach using Monte Carlo maximum likelihood methods has recently been successfully applied to estimate the impact of errors in exposures on an analysis of studies of radiation workers (Stayner et al., 2007). Need for Sensitivity Analysis Studies of veterans based on the Stellman team’s exposure model should include analyses to assess how sensitive the estimated association between the measured exposure opportunity and specific health outcomes is to various sources of uncertainty as well as to the various assumptions made in specifying the precise form of the model. In Chapter 3 the committee discussed the need for sensitivity analyses to summarize the variability in the model’s exposure metrics under different assumptions underlying the exposure opportunity model. The results of the sensitivity analyses for measurement of exposure opportunity would provide input into sensitivity analyses carried out during epidemiologic studies. These results will provide ranges and distributions of exposure opportunities that may be included in statistical estimates such as rate ratios and logistic regression parameters. By systematically varying the exposure opportunity metric, researchers can obtain a range or distribution of the estimated risks associated with the exposure, which reflects the implications of the underlying uncertainty in the assumptions of the Stellman team’s model. Although a “gold standard” measure of exposure is highly desirable for estimating the bias in a relative risk estimate due to exposure measure- ment error, it is not necessary for obtaining a plausible range of relative risk estimates associated with different exposure measures obtained from the model’s sensitivity analysis. The examination of this range of relative risk estimates will increase the likelihood of identifying associations of potential importance, and it will also help to reflect more accurately the uncertainty inherent in all of the indices of herbicide exposure. Providing Access for Independent Investigators By taking full—and appropriate—advantage of their unique access to and knowledge of data sources on veterans’ health, VA’s intramural inves- tigators have been prominent in investigations of relationships between veterans’ exposures during the Vietnam War and the health effects they have experienced. However, the committee sees important benefits in open- ing research opportunities to the broader scientific community through contracts or collaborations. Adopting this broader approach to research on veterans’ health should enhance the potential for identifying novel, creative

96 PROXIMITY-BASED HERBICIDE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT applications of the Stellman team’s model. In addition, public acceptance of and trust in the findings may be enhanced if the research processes are made more accessible. The committee recognizes that, as described in Chapter 4, accessing the needed service records and health outcomes data presents substantial logis- tical challenges for most investigators outside VA. Because the committee sees value in trying to improve the ability of a broad range of ­researchers to work with those data resources, it recommends that VA work with the Department of Defense (DoD), the individual branches of the armed forces as necessary, and the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in at least two specific areas: first, to facilitate health research uses of military records that are subject to access barriers arising from privacy laws; and, second, to help arrange for DoD and NARA staff with appropri- ate expertise to aid researchers in the location and interpretation of military records for health research uses. Promoting Refinements and Extensions of Epidemiologic Studies Using the Stellman Team’s Model The committee was very encouraged to learn that Dr. Jeanne Stellman has received funding from the National Library of Medicine (NLM) for a 3-year project to support work on—and to facilitate researchers’ access to—the exposure assessment model and the data on herbicide spraying and unit and troop locations that have been assembled to date (Stellman, 2007a). Assembling these data has required a substantial effort, and making them available to others via a planned website can be expected to remove a major obstacle to their broader use. The committee wants to encourage those who conduct studies applying the Stellman model not only to address meaningful epidemiologic questions but also to follow the example set by the Stellman team in contributing building blocks for reanalyses and refine- ments by others. This approach is clearly in the spirit of reproducible epidemiologic research proposed by Peng and colleagues (2006). Their criteria for repro- ducibility call for “datasets and software to be made available to the scientific community for (1) verifying published findings; (2) conducting alternative analyses of the same data; (3) eliminating uninformed criticisms that do not stand up to existing data; and (4) expediting the interchange of ideas among investigators” (Peng et al., 2006, p. 783). A study is considered reproducible when it satisfies the criteria in Table 5-1. The Stellman team considers all of the software code that they have developed to be open source and will provide it to researchers upon request (Stellman, 2007b).

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 97 TABLE 5-1  Criteria for Reproducible Epidemiologic Research Research Component Requirement Data Analytical data set is available. Methods Computer code underlying figures, tables, and other principal results is available in a human-readable form. In addition, the software necessary to execute the code is available. Documentation Adequate documentation of the computer code, software environment, and analytical data set is available to enable others to repeat the analyses and conduct other similar ones. Distribution Standard methods of distribution are employed for others to access the software, data, and documentation. SOURCE: Peng et al., 2006. Reproduced with permission. Peng et al. (2006) make a distinction between “measured” data and “analytical” data. The measured data are raw data, such as digital images of the military records extracted from the archives. These measured data are processed to create analytical data, such as the geocoded HERBS file and other individual electronic databases. The analytical data in turn serve as the input to analysis programs to produce such outputs as the exposure metrics of hits or the exposure opportunity index (EOI). Making available the data in the cleaned and checked HERBS file along with the source code and documentation for arriving at the calculated an exposure measures (hits and EOI) for each grid location, as the Stellman team plans to do, would go far toward making the workings of the herbicide exposure assessment model reproducible by other researchers. Similarly, their plans to make pub- licly available the compiled, cleaned, and checked databases of unit loca- tions already developed would facilitate the work of future researchers. The committee sees such steps as important for those who use the expo- sure assessment model in epidemiologic studies, and it urges researchers, including those at VA, to promote the reproducibility of studies conducted using the Stellman team’s model. The work that they carry out to determine unit locations and calculations used to arrive at exposure indices should be documented and made available, ideally through the Internet and potentially via the resources being developed under Dr. Stellman’s NLM grant, to enable others to repeat the analyses. Any extension or refinement of the model should also be documented so that others can evaluate and build on the work. TYPES OF STUDIES FOR CONSIDERATION Specific study designs must be determined on the basis of the questions chosen for investigation, but, in principle, either cohort or case-control studies may be appropriate for studying Vietnam veterans.

98 PROXIMITY-BASED HERBICIDE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT Cohort Studies Cohort studies require defining a population of interest, selecting study subjects who will be representative of the larger group, and choosing whether it is more appropriate (or feasible) to study the group’s cumulative health experience up to the time of the study (a retrospective approach) or to follow the group into the future to observe changes in their health status (a prospective approach). One challenge for a cohort study is identifying the members of a popu- lation of interest from which a study sample can be selected. A complete roster, or even a representative sample, of U.S. veterans who served in Vietnam is not readily available to researchers outside VA. An alternative approach would be to make use of all or a subsample of a group of Vietnam veterans selected for a previous study. Oversampling those who were closer to herbicide spraying may improve statistical power. Obtaining information on potential confounding variables (e.g., tobacco, alcohol, or drug use) will be important. It may be possible to control confounding indirectly to some degree by controlling for military rank or other socioeconomic factors or else by stratifying or restricting the analyses on the basis of other related variables, such as the level of potential combat experience. With a retrospective cohort approach it may be difficult to obtain accurate information on confounders, particularly for those study subjects who are deceased. In a prospective cohort study, Vietnam veterans who are alive today would be interviewed to obtain information on poten- tial confounding factors and then followed to determine their subsequent incidence of or mortality from diseases of interest. Other tradeoffs between retrospective and prospective approaches should also be considered. A prospective cohort study will take many years to accrue a sufficient number of cases for a meaningful analysis. It will probably be considerably more expensive than a retrospective study because of the need to identify and monitor large populations over extended periods into the future. Even a retrospective study, though likely to be less expensive than a prospective study, will still be expensive because of the need to conduct extensive manual searching to obtain the necessary troop assignment information for linkage with the Stellman team’s exposure assessment model. Because of the costs that are likely to be associated with conducting an entirely new cohort study, the most practical approach may be to start with study groups that have already been assembled. Some of the previously studied populations are described later in this chapter.

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 99 Case-Control Studies An alternative to conducting cohort studies would be to use a case- c ­ ontrol approach. Case-control studies involve selecting cases of a particu- lar disease (e.g., specific cancers, diabetes, a neurologic disease) as well as a set of controls who are representative of the population from which the cases developed. This is the strategy being followed by Dr. Stellman (2007c) in a study of ALS and by Dr. Han Kang and colleagues at VA in a study of soft tissue sarcoma (VA, 2007). The primary advantage of a case-control approach over a cohort study is that the cost of obtaining information on study subjects is much lower because the size of the study population is much smaller. Because of the expense involved in obtaining data on study subjects’ location histories and lifestyle factors (e.g., tobacco, alcohol, and drug use), a case-control approach may be the most cost-effective design for studying Vietnam veterans. Among case-control studies, those in which cases and controls are sampled from a defined cohort would be optimal. The controls can be randomly selected either from those subjects at risk at the begin- ning of the cohort study (generally referred to as a case-cohort design) or from those subjects at risk of developing the disease at the time each case occurred (generally referred to as a nested case-control study). POTENTIAL STUDY POPULATIONS Using existing study populations and databases for an epidemiologic investigation of Vietnam veterans is desirable because of the expense and logistical difficulties in constructing a study database. The committee is aware of the following potential study populations that should be consid- ered for studies using the Stellman team’s model. VA Study Populations and Registries One source of frustration for researchers in the years following the Vietnam War was the lack of a comprehensive list of U.S. military personnel who had served in Vietnam. In response to an IOM (1994) recommenda- tion, DoD and VA worked together to compile of list of those who served in Vietnam, using three data sources: the VA Beneficiary Identification and Record Locator Subsystem (BIRLS), DoD personnel files and post-service files, and state rosters of recipients of Vietnam service bonuses (Kang, 2007a). Completed in 1996, the roster includes more than 3 million vet- erans, of whom 50 percent are identified as having served in the Army, 17 percent in the Air Force, 13 percent in the Marine Corps, 8 percent in

100 PROXIMITY-BASED HERBICIDE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT the Navy, 0.1 percent in the Coast Guard, and 12 percent with no branch of service identified. The contribution that this roster could make to studies of Vietnam veterans needs further evaluation, but the roster could prove a useful starting point if access issues can be overcome. Its large size makes it par- ticularly attractive as a potential sampling frame for conducting a cohort study, but the database does not have complete information for all records. For example, only 64 percent of the records include both start and end dates of military service (Kang, 2007b). Furthermore, the database does not include the dates for each veteran’s arrival in and departure from the Vietnam theater of operations. If the roster were approached without a means of selecting for members of specific units for which location histories can be determined on a group basis, the challenge of developing the loca- tion information and assigning exposures to large numbers of individuals using the Stellman team’s exposure model would be considerable. One promising approach would be to conduct follow-up on the entire cohort and then to perform nested case-control studies for outcomes of a priori interest or for any outcomes that are found to be in excess in the cohort. This approach, if feasible, would minimize the amount of work involved in obtaining the location information and other information needed for estimating exposures. As noted in Chapter 4, VA also has electronic databases that include information on mortality and inpatient and outpatient treatment as well as special registries for veterans with conditions such as ALS and mul- tiple sclerosis. These resources have been used in the past for case-control s ­ tudies of Vietnam veterans. For example, Dalager et al. (1991) examined the association between non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma (NHL) and service in Vietnam. The study included 201 Vietnam-era veterans with NHL and 358 with diagnoses other than any form of malignant lymphoma, all of whom were identified using the VA Patient Treatment File (PTF). The investigators were able to establish whether the study subjects had served in Vietnam and to gather information on dates of service, military occupational specialty codes, and unit identifications for each assignment by reviewing military service records at the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis. VA has also carried out case-control studies for soft-tissue sarcoma (Kang et al., 1986), Hodgkin’s disease (Dalager et al., 1995), lung cancer (Mahan et al., 1997), and testicular cancer (Bullman et al., 1994). An important limitation of this approach is that it will be based only on the population of veterans who receive medical care from VA. VA has also carried out mortality studies of Vietnam veterans who served in the Army or Marine Corps (e.g., Breslin et al., 1988; ­Watanabe and Kang, 1995, 1996). The most recent of these studies included approxi- mately 33,800 deceased veterans who had served in Vietnam. The data

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 101 abstracted from their military personnel records included their dates of Vietnam service, principal duty, and unit addresses. As noted below, VA researchers are planning to explore application of the Stellman team’s model to these study populations (VA, 2007). In addition, VA maintains the Agent Orange Registry, which includes about 409,000 Vietnam veterans (Kang, 2007a). This registry is composed of individuals who volunteered for a physical examination because of their concerns regarding herbicide exposure. Its membership may have a high proportion of those veterans who were proximal to spraying, potentially making it a useful source of somewhat more highly exposed study subjects. However, the registry also has the potential to selectively include not only those who were proximal to spraying but also those who suffered health problems perceived as being associated with herbicide exposure. If so, this combination would introduce a bias into any study of the health effects associated with herbicide exposure that was performed on a population selected from this registry. The CDC Agent Orange Study In the 1980s, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) initiated work on three studies of Vietnam veterans, one of which was intended to focus on the health effects of Agent Orange exposure. The exposure study was planned to include approximately 17,000 soldiers from 65 Army combat battalions that served in III Corps during 1967–1968 (CDC, 1985). Selection criteria for individual study subjects included the following: (1) draftees and single-term enlistees, (2) pay grades E1 through E5, (3) only one tour of duty in Vietnam, and (4) at least 6 months served in a single unit. Plans for the study were abandoned after a related CDC validation study found that serum levels of TCDD in Vietnam veterans were not significantly different from those of veterans who did not serve in Viet- nam and bore no relationship to the proximity-based exposure measures used in the study (CDC, 1988). The unit location records collected for the Agent Orange Exposure study were later located by the Stellman team and have been further cleaned and checked (Stellman and Stellman, 2003), making them a potentially use- ful resource for studies of the health effects of herbicide exposure. Other potential resources are public-use data files constructed by CDC in con- junction with its validation study as well as a separate Vietnam Experience Study (Barrett, 2007). CDC also holds additional data files related to these studies that are protected by confidentiality agreements. One major limitation of the CDC groups as potential study popula- tions is that the soldiers with greater exposure opportunity may have been eliminated from the studies because of the requirement that eligible subjects

102 PROXIMITY-BASED HERBICIDE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT have only one tour of duty in Vietnam. Another concern is that the study populations may not be large enough to permit the detection of risk for rarer health effects, such as soft tissue sarcomas or NHL. Units Identified as More Highly Exposed Based on the Stellman Team’s Exposure Assessment Model Other potential targets for study that warrant consideration are mem- bers of military units for which location histories have already been tracked and for which the exposure assessment model suggests the likelihood of higher exposure compared with other units. In other words, units with high EOI values could be selected for further investigation. Alternatively, groups with the potential for greater herbicide exposure could be identified by examining the map of sprayed areas in conjunction with approximately known locations of military units. The cancelled CDC study of the 1980s used the approach of selecting units that had served in areas of heavy spraying. However, future ­researchers who take a similar approach may want to include study participants with more than one tour of duty and take full advantage of the knowledge gained by the Stellman team in their efforts to characterize exposures by service unit. Even with unit location histories, researchers will still need to compile full unit assignment histories for individual subjects and ascertain their health experience. The committee notes that the Air Force Ranch Hand personnel and Army Chemical Corps personnel are two groups of veterans that are not suitable study populations when the Stellman team’s model is to be used, even though their exposures to herbicides are likely to be among the high- est of all veterans. Most of their herbicide exposures were a direct result of duties that required handling or applying herbicides. By contrast, the model is designed to assess the exposure opportunity that would result from unintended proximity to herbicide spraying. Australian and Korean Veterans of Vietnam Approximately 59,200 Australian men have been identified as veterans of military service in Vietnam (Wilson et al., 2005b), and numerous studies have been made of the morbidity and mortality of Australian veterans (e.g., see list in Wilson and Horsley, 2003). A third round of retrospective cohort studies commissioned by the Australian government was completed in 2005 (Wilson et al., 2005a,b,c). Some studies of Australian veterans of the Vietnam War have relied on comparisons with the general Australian population to assess health risks, with the most recent reports showing elevated risks of certain cancers (e.g.,

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 103 lung and prostate) and liver disease (Wilson et al., 2005b,c). For many other conditions, veterans have lower risks than the general population. In studies specifically of conscripted veterans, comparisons have been made between those who served in Vietnam (approximately 19,200 men) and those who did not (24,700 men) (e.g., Fett et al., 1987; Crane et al., 1997; Wilson et al., 2005a). The most recent of these studies found that Vietnam veterans had significantly higher incidence and mortality rates of lung and pancreatic cancers and a higher incidence of head and neck cancer (Wilson et al., 2005a). The effects of herbicide exposure have been a concern among Aus- tralian veterans, and, as with many studies of U.S. veterans, service in Vietnam has often constituted the exposure criterion in Australian studies. Thus Australian veterans would seem to present another opportunity for application of the Stellman team’s exposure assessment model. A search- able roster of these veterans has been compiled and is accessible through the Internet (http://www.vietnamroll.gov.au/). In communications with Dr. Keith Horsley (2007a,b) of the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, the committee also learned that records of ground troop locations are poor for land-based Australian Navy and Air Force personnel and generally good for most Australian Army units (the Australian Task Force). According to Dr. Horsley, location information for the Task Force, roughly 38,000 men, is frequently available down to the section level of nine people. The A ­ ustralian military records are in paper form and stored in the archives of the Australian Department of Defense (Horsley, 2007a). Reconstructing troop locations for Australian service members would seem to pose some of the same challenges as for U.S. troops. The committee did not explore access issues for these records but can see application of the exposure assessment model as a reasonable possibility. Approximately 320,000 South Korean soldiers also participated in the Vietnam War, and more than 92,000 soldiers have reported having health problems related to Agent Orange exposure (Kim et al., 2003). A research group conducted a study of morbidity and mortality of Korean soldiers using EOI values from the Stellman team’s model (Yonsei Medical Institu- tion, 2006). To the best of the committee’s knowledge, this is the only completed analysis to date that has used the current version of the Stellman team’s model. Complete information on study methods and findings was not available to the committee at the time this report was written, but the approach is of particular interest as an example of the application of the exposure assessment model. As details become available, the design and results of this study may be of use to other researchers planning to apply the model.   ersonal P communication, S.-W. Yi, Kwandong University, August 17, 2007.

104 PROXIMITY-BASED HERBICIDE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT Residents of Vietnam The Stellman team’s model may also be of use in estimating potential herbicide exposures and studying health outcomes in Vietnamese soldiers and civilians. With the possible exception of the U.S. Air Force personnel participating in Operation Ranch Hand and the Army Chemical Corps, it is likely that the Vietnamese population experienced higher levels of exposure than did U.S. troops because of the greater opportunity of the Vietnamese to be exposed through multiple routes, including inhalation, ingestion of local food and water, and dermal contact with soil and sediments in sprayed areas. Although the possibility of applying the Stellman team’s model to studies of the Vietnamese is of interest and potentially informative about the health effects of herbicides, the committee saw such studies as contribut- ing only indirectly to a better understanding of the health of U.S. veterans, which was the focus of its charge. Committee Observations The committee sees the potential for researchers to pursue studies in a variety of Vietnam veteran populations, while noting that each population presents different trade-offs in terms of magnitude of effort, the avail- ability of data on locations of service in Vietnam, representation of those more likely to have been exposed, and access to data on health outcomes. Researchers will need to direct their efforts based on the particulars of their research questions and on available resources. The committee believes that the most promising studies are either those that use groups where higher exposure to herbicides appears likely based on analysis of existing unit or troop movement information, or case-control studies nested in large cohorts already assembled, possibly including the VA roster of 3 million Vietnam veterans. ONGOING VA WORK TO APPLY THE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT MODEL Dr. Han Kang and colleagues at VA have several projects under way to explore use of the Stellman team’s model (VA, 2007). The work “aims to evaluate the validity and utility of this model . . . using the databases already collected from previous health studies on Vietnam veterans.” They have described three specific areas of inquiry: 1. Does the model generate internally consistent index exposure scores that are consistent with variation in military mission? To test this, five military units stationed in Vietnam during the height of Agent Orange

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 105 spraying in 1968 will be tracked for geographic location in Vietnam for one year, using the databases already collected by Dr. Stellman and her team. 2. Does the model demonstrate a positive association between the index exposure scores and the prevalence or incidence of health outcomes that are considered truly associated with herbicides, such as soft tissue sarcoma, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, and Hodgkin’s disease? To test this, veteran study subjects from three existing case-control study databases and three Vietnam veterans’ mortality study databases will be used. Geographic locations and time of service in Vietnam will be tracked for the cancer cases and the controls and then applied to the model. 3. Does application of the model to existing epidemiologic study databases generate additional information on the health effects of exposure to herbicide in Vietnam beyond what is already known? How much time and resources are required to conduct a health study of Vietnam veterans using the model? The model will be applied to three existing databases: the Agent Orange Registry of 409,000 Vietnam veterans, Marine Corps Vietnam Veterans, and Women Vietnam Veterans. When Dr. Kang and his colleagues met with the committee in spring 2007, they reported that efforts were under way to construct location his- tories for the veterans who would be included in the reanalyses. Calculation of exposure metrics using the Stellman team’s model had not yet begun. The committee sees the value of VA’s work in investigating the feasibil- ity of obtaining the needed model inputs and generating exposure scores. Because of its unique insights into military records and databases, the VA research group has the potential for achieving success that can be docu- mented and shared with other researchers beyond VA. Completion of this work should thus prove worthwhile and informative for methodologic pur- poses in addition to generating epidemiologic findings that relate estimated exposure opportunity to particular health outcomes. Nevertheless, as has previously been observed (IOM, 2003), such s ­ tudies are of limited value in moving toward the stated goal of validat- ing the model. If positive, these studies would lend support to the model’s potential use. If the results are negative, though, the findings will be dif- ficult to interpret. They cannot disprove the value of the proximity model because the levels of exposure may be lower than would cause adverse health effects or because the study’s power may be insufficient to address the question adequately. Although the work that the VA researchers are conducting will make an important contribution, its scope falls short of the complete array of work that the committee believes would be appropriate. The committee understands that not all the efforts it proposes can be undertaken at once, but it does have some specific concerns. In the morbidity studies that are

106 PROXIMITY-BASED HERBICIDE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT to be revisited, the range of health outcomes is limited, the ascertainment of those health outcomes ended for the most recent of the studies in 1985, and the health data are limited to events identified among veterans who participated in the VA health care system. There do not appear to be plans to conduct sensitivity analyses or explore ways in which the model might be extended. In addition, there is no indication of plans to create a resource that other investigators, including those outside VA, could expand upon. For these reasons, the committee sees the VA work as insufficient by itself to constitute the best use of the exposure assessment model. CONTRIBUTION TO THE ONGOING IOM REVIEWS OF THE ASSOCIATION BETWEEN HERBICIDE EXPOSURE AND HEALTH OUTCOMES The biennial reviews carried out by IOM committees to examine poten- tial associations between herbicide exposure and health effects have had to rely in large measure on studies in populations other than Vietnam veterans to reach conclusions regarding the strength of such associations. Applica- tion of the herbicide exposure assessment model in epidemiologic studies of Vietnam veterans has the potential to contribute to the body of work that future committees can evaluate. No single study should be expected to pro- vide definitive evidence, but results derived from studies of the population of interest will be a welcome addition. The committee reiterates, however, that because of the potential for exposure misclassification and concerns about statistical power, studies of Vietnam veterans that make use of the proximity-based exposure surrogates must always be viewed as informative rather than definitive. CONCLUSIONS The committee reached the following specific conclusions regarding the use of the Stellman team’s herbicide exposure assessment model in epidemiologic studies: 1. Epidemiologic studies of health outcomes among Vietnam veterans that use the exposure opportunity index are capable of characterizing the health of veterans in relation to their proximity to herbicide spraying. Such studies would provide an improvement in evaluating potential effects of herbicide exposure compared to studies based on Vietnam service in gen-   ase ascertainment for the case-control studies carried out by VA extended to the following C years: NHL, 1985 (Dalager et al., 1991); Hodgkin’s disease, 1985 (Dalager et al., 1995); and soft tissue sarcoma, 1983 (Kang et al., 1986).

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 107 eral. This improvement may permit observation of associations between herbicide exposure and health effects in the Vietnam veteran population that were not identifiable in previous studies. 2. The ongoing efforts by the VA investigators to apply the model in existing case-control study populations are useful for characterizing the logistical challenges and the magnitude of effort needed to apply the model, but they are limited and insufficiently accessible to future researchers and the broader research community and so do not constitute, in isolation, the best use of the exposure assessment model. 3. The most promising study designs for applications of the model would be (1) to selectively sample units based on exposure potential, gath- ering relevant information from unit records, individual service records, and sources of individual health outcomes data; or (2) to build on large cohorts already assembled and pursue nested case-control studies of outcomes of interest with linkage to units, unit locations, and exposure potential. 4. Efforts to validate the model solely by examining health outcomes believed to be related to herbicide exposure are of limited value. If posi- tive, such studies would add support to the model’s potential value, but, if negative, the model’s value would not be disproved because the levels of exposure may be lower than would cause adverse health effects or the study’s power may be insufficient to address the question adequately. RECOMMENDATIONS The committee’s conclusions from its consideration of the Stellman team’s herbicide exposure assessment model led it to make the following recommendations: 1. VA should sponsor epidemiologic studies of Vietnam veterans that take into account the criteria below regarding the appropriate characteristics of informative research on herbicide exposure and health outcomes in this population. VA should draw on the criteria as the basis for developing a request for proposals. Specifically, to make the best use of the exposure assessment model, epidemiologic studies of Vietnam veterans should have the follow- ing characteristics: a. The study population should be broadly representative of Viet- nam veterans, with care taken to include sufficient numbers of study participants with relatively higher exposure. b. A broad range of health outcomes should be considered, not just those that are suspected of being related to herbicide expo-

108 PROXIMITY-BASED HERBICIDE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT sure. Where feasible, morbidity should be studied in addition to mortality. c. The health data should be as complete and up-to-date as possible. d. The study should have sufficient statistical power to address the range of health outcomes of concern. e. To isolate the effects of herbicide exposure, potential con- founding factors need to be carefully addressed in the study design or the analytic approach. f. Analyses should be conducted to evaluate how sensitive the estimated associations between exposure opportunity and health outcomes are to the uncertainty in the exposure oppor- tunity metrics and to varying approaches to estimating her- bicide exposure, possibly including alternative approaches to exposure assignment as discussed in Chapter 3. g. Opportunities to conduct research using the exposure assess- ment model should be open to investigators beyond the VA sys- tem to allow for the benefits of engaging the broader research community and to enhance public acceptance and credibility. 2. In support of the recommended epidemiologic studies, VA should work with DoD and NARA to • facilitate health research uses of military records that are sub- ject to access barriers arising from privacy laws, and • arrange for assistance from DoD and NARA staff with appro- priate expertise to aid researchers in the location and interpre- tation of military records for health research uses. REFERENCES Barrett, D. H. 2007. Letter to L. Joellenbeck, with accompanying materials. Atlanta, GA, June 22. Breslin, P., H. K. Kang, Y. Lee, V. Burt, and B. Shepard. 1988. Proportionate mortality study of US Army and US Marine Corps veterans of the Vietnam War. Journal of Occupational Medicine 30(5):412–419. Bullman, T. A., K. K. Watanabe, and H. K. Kang. 1994. Risk of testicular cancer associated with surrogate measures of Agent Orange exposure among Vietnam veterans on the Agent Orange Registry. Annals of Epidemiology 4:11–16. CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention). 1985. Exposure assessment for the Agent Orange study. Interim Report Number 2. Typescript. CDC. 1988. Serum 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin levels in U.S. Army Vietnam-era vet- erans. The Centers for Disease Control Veterans Health Studies. Journal of the American Medical Association 260(9):1249–1254.

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 109 CDC. 1989. Comparison of serum levels of 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin with indirect estimates of Agent Orange exposure among Vietnam veterans: Final report. Atlanta, GA: Agent Orange Projects, Center for Environmental Health and Injury Control. Crane, P. J., D. L. Barnard, K. W. Horsley, M. A. Adena. 1997. Mortality of national service Vietnam veterans: A report of the 1996 retrospective cohort study of Australian Vietnam veterans. Canberra, Australia: Department of Veterans’ Affairs. Dalager, N. A., H. K. Kang, V. L. Burt, and L. Weatherbee. 1991. Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma among Vietnam veterans. Journal of Occupational Medicine 33(7):774–779. Dalager, N. A., H. K. Kang, V. L. Burt, and L. Weatherbee. 1995. Hodgkin’s disease and Vietnam service. Annals of Epidemiology 5(5):400–406. Dominici, F., S. L. Zeger, and J. M. Samet. 2000. A measurement error model for time-series studies of air pollution and mortality. Biostatistics 1(2):157–175. Dwernychuk, L. W. 2005. Dioxin hot spots in Vietnam. Chemosphere 60:998–999. Dwernychuk, L. W., H. D. Cau, C. T. Hatfield, T. G. Boivin, T. M. Hung, P. T. Dung, and N. D. Thai. 2002. Dioxin reservoirs in southern Viet Nam—A legacy of Agent Orange. Chemosphere 47(2):117–137. Fett, M. J., J. R. Nairn, D. M. Cobbin, and M. A. Adena. 1987. Mortality among Australian conscripts of the Vietnam conflict era. II. Causes of death. American Journal of Epide- miology 125:878–884. Flegal, K. M., C. Brownie, and J. D. Haas. 1986. The effects of exposure misclassification on estimates of relative risk. American Journal of Epidemiology 123(4):736–751. Greenland, S. 2000. Principles of multilevel modeling. International Journal of Epidemiology 29:158–167. Hatfield Consultants and Office of the National Steering Committee 33, MNRE (Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, Vietnam). 2007. Assessment of dioxin contamina- tion in the environment and human population in the vicinity of Da Nang Airbase, Viet Nam: Final report. West Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Horsley, K. 2007a. Re: Inquiry regarding Australian veterans and Agent Orange studies. E‑mail to L. Joellenbeck, June 4. Horsley, K. 2007b. Re: Inquiry regarding Australian veterans and Agent Orange studies. E‑mail to L. Joellenbeck, June 28. IOM (Institute of Medicine). 1994. Veterans and Agent Orange: Health effects of herbicides used in Vietnam. Washington, DC: National Academy Press. IOM. 2003. Characterizing exposure of veterans to Agent Orange and other herbicides used in Vietnam: Interim findings and recommendations. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. IOM. 2007. Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2006. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. Kang, H. K. 2007a. Data resources within VA for an epidemiological study of Vietnam ­ eterans. PowerPoint presentation to the IOM Committee on Making Best Use of the v Agent Orange Reconstruction Model, Meeting 2, April 30–May 1, Washington, DC. Kang, H. K. 2007b. Vietnam roster veterans: Demographic/military service characteristics. Unpublished document submitted to the IOM Committee on Making the Best Use of the Agent Orange Reconstruction Model, July 11. Kang, H. K., L. Weatherbee, P. Breslin, Y. Lee, and B. Shepard. 1986. Soft tissue sarcomas and military service in Vietnam: A case comparison group analysis of hospital patients. Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine 28(12):1215–1218. Kim, H. A., E. M. Kim, Y. C. Park, J. Y. Yu, S. K. Hong, S. H. Jeon, K. L. Park, S. J. Hur, and Y. Heo. 2003. Immunotoxicological effects of Agent Orange exposure to the Vietnam War Korean veterans. Industrial Health 41:158–166.

110 PROXIMITY-BASED HERBICIDE EXPOSURE ASSESSMENT Mahan, C. M., T. A. Bullman, and H. K. Kang. 1997. A case-control study of lung ­cancer among Vietnam veterans. Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine 39(8):740–747. McFall, M. E., M. E. Mackay, and D. M. Donovan. 1992. Combat-related posttraumatic stress disorder and severity of substance abuse in Vietnam veterans. Journal of Studies on Alcohol 53(4):357–363. Michalek, J. E., S. P. Caudill, and R. C. Tripathi. 1996. Pharmacokinetics of TCDD in veterans of Operation Ranch Hand: 10-year follow-up. Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health 47:209–220. Mocarelli, P., L. L. Needham, A. Marocchi, D. G. Patterson, Jr., P. Brambilla, P. M. Gerthoux, L. Meazza, and V. Carreri. 1991. Serum concentrations of 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p- dioxin and test results from selected residents of Seveso, Italy. Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health 32:357–366. Peng, R. D., F. Dominici, and S. L. Zeger. 2006. Reproducible epidemiologic research. Ameri- can Journal of Epidemiology 163(9):783–789. Pirkle, J. L., and V. N. Houk. 1992. Use of epidemiologic studies to assess human risk from exposure to 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin. Chemosphere 25(7–10):1109–1115. Stayner, L., M. Vrijheid, E. Cardis, D. O. Stram, I. Deltour, S. J. Gilbert, and G. Howe. 2007. A Monte Carlo maximum likelihood method for estimating uncertainty arising from shared errors in exposures in epidemiological studies of nuclear workers. Radiation Research 168(6):757–763. Stellman, J. M. 2007a. A data resource for the health and environmental consequences of the Vietnam War. Unpublished document submitted to the IOM Committee on Making the Best Use of the Agent Orange Reconstruction Model, July 31. Stellman, J. M. 2007b. Responses to IOM 091407. Unpublished document submitted to the IOM Committee on Making the Best Use of the Agent Orange Reconstruction Model, September 14. Stellman, J. M. 2007c. Separate modeling and reconstruction issues. PowerPoint presentation to the IOM Committee on Making Best Use of the Agent Orange Reconstruction Model, Meeting 3, June 13–14, Washington, DC. Stellman, J. M., and S. D. Stellman. 2003. Contractor’s final report: Characterizing exposure of veterans to Agent Orange and other herbicides in Vietnam. Submitted to the National Academy of Sciences, Institute of Medicine, in fulfillment of Subcontract VA-5124-98- 0019, June 30, 2003. Sweeney, M. H., G. M. Calvert, G. A. Egeland, M. A. Fingerhut, W. E. Halperin, and L. A. Piacitelli. 1997–1998. Review and update of the results of the NIOSH medical study of workers exposed to chemicals contaminated with 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzodioxin. Teratogenesis, Carcinogenesis, and Mutagenesis 17(4–5):241–247. VA (U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs). 2007. Evaluation of Dr. Stellman’s herbicide exposure reconstruction model. http://www.va.gov/wriisc-dc/research/studies_ongoing. asp#Stellman (accessed February 22, 2007). Watanabe, K. K., and H. K. Kang. 1995. Military service in Vietnam and the risk of death from trauma and selected cancers. Annals of Epidemiology 5:407–412. Watanabe, K. K., and H. K. Kang. 1996. Mortality patterns among Vietnam veterans. Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine 38(3):272–278. Wilson, E. J., and K. W. A. Horsley. 2003. Health effects of Vietnam service. ADF Health 4:59–65. Wilson, E. J., K. W. Horsley, and R. van der Hoek. 2005a. Australian National Service Viet- nam Veterans Mortality and Cancer Incidence Study 2005. Canberra, Australia: Depart- ment of Veterans’ Affairs.

RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES 111 Wilson, E. J., K. W. Horsley, and R. van der Hoek. 2005b. Australian Vietnam Veterans Mor- tality Study 2005. Canberra, Australia: Department of Veterans’ Affairs. Wilson, E. J., K. W. Horsley, and R. van der Hoek. 2005c. Cancer Incidence in Australian Vietnam Veterans Study 2005. Canberra, Australia: Department of Veterans’ Affairs. Yonsei Medical Institution. 2006. [Final report: Dynamic study for defoliant (Agent Orange) damages.] Report to the Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs, Republic of Korea.

Next: Appendix A: Agendas for Information-Gathering Meetings »
The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans Get This Book
×
Buy Paperback | $52.00 Buy Ebook | $41.99
MyNAP members save 10% online.
Login or Register to save!
Download Free PDF

A fundamental challenge in past studies evaluating whether health problems experienced by Vietnam veterans might be linked to wartime use of Agent Orange or other herbicides has been a lack of information about the veterans' level of exposure to these herbicides. To address that problem, researchers developed a model to assess the opportunity for herbicide exposure among these veterans.

The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans presents the conclusions and recommendations of an Institute of Medicine committee (IOM) that was convened to provide guidance to the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) about the best use of a model to characterize exposure to the troops based on their proximity to herbicide spraying in Vietnam. This book's assessment is guided by four primary considerations: to be clear about what the assessment model does and does not claim to do; to gain understanding of the strengths and limitations of data on herbicide spraying, troop locations, and health outcomes; to consider whether the model locates spraying and troops accurately to consider the potential contributions and pitfalls of using it in epidemiologic studies. Of particular interest in these deliberations were the degree to which exposure classification might be improved if the model were to be used, and the appropriate interpretation of the results of any such studies.

In light of the questions that remain concerning herbicide exposure and health among Vietnam veterans and the array of evidence that has thus far been brought to bear on that issue, The Utility of Proximity-Based Herbicide Exposure Assessment in Epidemiologic Studies of Vietnam Veterans concludes that the application of this model offers a constructive approach to extending knowledge about the effects of herbicides on the health of these veterans and merits the initial steps recommended in our report.

  1. ×

    Welcome to OpenBook!

    You're looking at OpenBook, NAP.edu's online reading room since 1999. Based on feedback from you, our users, we've made some improvements that make it easier than ever to read thousands of publications on our website.

    Do you want to take a quick tour of the OpenBook's features?

    No Thanks Take a Tour »
  2. ×

    Show this book's table of contents, where you can jump to any chapter by name.

    « Back Next »
  3. ×

    ...or use these buttons to go back to the previous chapter or skip to the next one.

    « Back Next »
  4. ×

    Jump up to the previous page or down to the next one. Also, you can type in a page number and press Enter to go directly to that page in the book.

    « Back Next »
  5. ×

    To search the entire text of this book, type in your search term here and press Enter.

    « Back Next »
  6. ×

    Share a link to this book page on your preferred social network or via email.

    « Back Next »
  7. ×

    View our suggested citation for this chapter.

    « Back Next »
  8. ×

    Ready to take your reading offline? Click here to buy this book in print or download it as a free PDF, if available.

    « Back Next »
Stay Connected!