SLIDE 13 Occupational Cancer - Chance and Science
WOODWORKER’S ETHMOIDAL CANCER. In 1963, the present writer was invited to deliver the Sir William Wilde oration in Dublin. The choice of subject within the general
- tolaryngological field is by custom left to the lecturer and he is given a year’s notice. I
felt that malignant disease of the paranasal sinuses might be a good topic for two reasons: nobody had reviewed the subject recently, and it was at that time one of my major interests. It is possible, therefore, at this point to identify two elements of chance: my having been nominated to give the oration, and my choice of subject…. It seemed sensible to study the records of all cases of such disease seen and treated at the Radcliffe Infirmary (the Oxford teaching hospital) in the previous 25 years… The main point relevant here was the emergence of a group of such cases emanating from the small market town of High Wycombe. …High Wycombe lies about halfway between Oxford and London … The major local industry for about 300 years has been making furniture from the local timber. The otolaryngologist resident in High Wycombe, Miss Esmé Hadfield, F.R.C.S., had by this time become interested…. Miss Hadfield undertook to look into the occupations of these patients. She became more and more convinced that woodworking was indeed a major factor in the etiology, and the matter was finally clinched when… a new patient turned up…suffering from a confirmed adenocarcinoma
- f the ethmoid. “Don’t tell me,” said Miss Hadfield, “that you are a furniture worker,” to
which the man replied, “As a matter of fact I am-how did you guess?”
