The observatory: a model for studies in health, society, and the environment.

The concept of an observatory for examining and monitoring trends for research in the social sciences and health arose from analogy with the facilities of astronomy and the realization that close and consistent observation was essential to understand interactions among determinants of health in a community. Their theoretical foundations are largely grounded in the "population health model," an intellectual framework developed in 1974 and associated with a movement called "the new public health." We developed an observatory for an affluent, unexceptional, suburban jurisdiction ("County 20") in the province of Alberta, in western Canada, and used it to study and monitor both normative and emergent issues in environmental health. The observatory was conceived as a utility, or multi-purpose vehicle, for describing and responding to emerging community issues quickly and gathering data and qualitative findings as required. Case studies on issues of local importance allowed us to observe the dynamics of community response comprehensively, using quantitative and qualitative methods as appropriate. Valuable insights gleaned from the cases studied pertained to risk perception, the NIMBY syndrome, and reorganizing and auditing public health services. It did less well when the object of study was further removed from the community of interest, when there was no clear action item to be recommended, and when sponsors had expectations for certainty that could not be supported by available data sources. The observatory eventually was merged into a community health outreach program. The local observatory model is a practical, low-cost, and sustainable model for capturing generalizable and specifically local case study experience on a small scale but is limited in its effectiveness and by the scope of its coverage. It can be an initial step toward longitudinal and community monitoring studies on a larger scale. The observatory model can be used to elevate the level of case studies, impose rigor on analysis, and compile case studies for comparative and analytical studies.

Trading One Risk for Another: Consequences of the Unauthenticated Treatment and Prevention of Silicosis in Ontario Miners in the McIntyre Powder Aluminum Inhalation Program.

From 1943 to 1979, miners and factory workers in more than two hundred work sites globally were subjected to mandatory medical treatments by their employers as an unproven, and ultimately ineffective, treatment to prevent the lung disease silicosis. The treatments involved inhaling finely ground aluminum dust known as McIntyre Powder, blown into miners' change rooms each shift using compressed air systems. Tens of thousands of industrial laborers were exposed to McIntyre Powder, yet their story is scarcely known, and the possible health impacts of their aluminum treatments were rarely studied. This paper integrates the history of the aluminum prophylaxis program and its control by the northern Ontario mining industry with the lived experience of one of the affected miners, whose daughter created a voluntary registry which documents health issues in exposed miners, and stimulated research that found a link to her father's Parkinson disease.

A century of the Archives of Environmental & Occupational Health.

With this issue, the Archives of Environmental & Occupational Health celebrates 100 years of continuous publication since its foundation as the Journal of Industrial Hygiene in 1919. During its first century, the Archives established an extraordinary legacy in the development of no less than three fields of research and practice: (1) occupational medicine, (2) industrial hygiene, and (3) air pollution studies and regulation. Its contribution to American environmental protection standards in air quality was particularly important, as the journal served as a major outlet for crucial air pollution research during the early years of the new United States Environmental Protection Agency. Its pages also chart the development of occupational health as an independent field, as well as the later emergence of modern environmental health as a related co-discipline. As the Archives moves into its second century of continuous publication, the journal will continue shaping the fields of environmental and occupational health; building on the solid foundation of evidence-based research from which humankind continues to benefit.