Anne-Claire Vergnaud1, Maria Aresu2, Dennis McRobie2, Deepa Singh2, Jeanette Spear2, Andy Heard2, Paul Elliott3. 1. Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, MRC-PHE Centre for Environment and Health, School of Public Health, Imperial College London, London, United Kingdom. Electronic address: a.vergnaud@imperial.ac.uk. 2. Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, MRC-PHE Centre for Environment and Health, School of Public Health, Imperial College London, London, United Kingdom. 3. Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, MRC-PHE Centre for Environment and Health, School of Public Health, Imperial College London, London, United Kingdom. Electronic address: p.elliott@imperial.ac.uk.
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Terrestrial Trunked Radio (TETRA) is a digital communication system progressively adopted by Police Forces in Great Britain since 2001. In 2000, the UK Independent Expert Group on Mobile Phones suggested that exposure to TETRA-like signal modulation might have adverse effects on health. The Airwave Health Monitoring Study was established to investigate possible long-term effects of TETRA use on health. This requires estimation of TETRA use among Police Force employees participating in the study. METHODS: We investigated TETRA usage among 42,112 Police officers and staff. An algorithm was created to link each personal radio user to his/her objective radio usage records for the 26,035 participants with available data. We linked 16,577 personal radio users to their objective radio usage records and compared self-reported usage with data from the TETRA operator for those individuals. RESULTS: For weekly usage, the correlation between self-reported and operator-derived personal radio usage was r=0.69 for number and r=0.59 for the duration of calls. Compared with objective data, participants under-reported the number of calls and over-reported the duration of calls by a factor of around 4 and 1.6 respectively. Correlations were lower and bias higher when looking at daily usage. CONCLUSION: Where both objective and self-reported information were available, our study showed substantial misreporting in self-reported TETRA usage. Successful linkage of large numbers of TETRA users to objective data on their personal radios will allow objective assessment of TETRA radio usage for these participants and development of algorithms to correct bias in self-reported data for the remainder.
BACKGROUND: Terrestrial Trunked Radio (TETRA) is a digital communication system progressively adopted by Police Forces in Great Britain since 2001. In 2000, the UK Independent Expert Group on Mobile Phones suggested that exposure to TETRA-like signal modulation might have adverse effects on health. The Airwave Health Monitoring Study was established to investigate possible long-term effects of TETRA use on health. This requires estimation of TETRA use among Police Force employees participating in the study. METHODS: We investigated TETRA usage among 42,112 Police officers and staff. An algorithm was created to link each personal radio user to his/her objective radio usage records for the 26,035 participants with available data. We linked 16,577 personal radio users to their objective radio usage records and compared self-reported usage with data from the TETRA operator for those individuals. RESULTS: For weekly usage, the correlation between self-reported and operator-derived personal radio usage was r=0.69 for number and r=0.59 for the duration of calls. Compared with objective data, participants under-reported the number of calls and over-reported the duration of calls by a factor of around 4 and 1.6 respectively. Correlations were lower and bias higher when looking at daily usage. CONCLUSION: Where both objective and self-reported information were available, our study showed substantial misreporting in self-reported TETRA usage. Successful linkage of large numbers of TETRA users to objective data on their personal radios will allow objective assessment of TETRA radio usage for these participants and development of algorithms to correct bias in self-reported data for the remainder.
Authors: Michael O Mireku; William Mueller; Charlotte Fleming; Irene Chang; Iroise Dumontheil; Michael S C Thomas; Marloes Eeftens; Paul Elliott; Martin Röösli; Mireille B Toledano Journal: Environ Res Date: 2018-02 Impact factor: 6.498
Authors: He Gao; Maria Aresu; Anne-Claire Vergnaud; Dennis McRobie; Jeanette Spear; Andy Heard; Håvard Wahl Kongsgård; Deepa Singh; David C Muller; Paul Elliott Journal: Br J Cancer Date: 2018-12-26 Impact factor: 7.640
Authors: Sharon A M Stevelink; Elena Opie; David Pernet; He Gao; Paul Elliott; Simon Wessely; Nicola T Fear; Matthew Hotopf; Neil Greenberg Journal: PLoS One Date: 2020-11-12 Impact factor: 3.240