ABSTRACT
Mobile phone technology was introduced in the 1980s, but it became popular in the mid1990s. Today, the majority of people worldwide use mobile phones. For communication, mobile phones emit radiofrequency (RF) electromagnetic fields that at high levels of exposure lead to heating of human tissue (International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection [ICNIRP] 2009). Mobile phone technologies comply with protection guidelines to prevent biologically relevant heating, but some concerns were expressed when mobile technology entered the markets on whether there were unknown biological effects related to RF fields that could lead to adverse health effects, including cancer (Microwave News 1992). Due to the increasing popularity of the technology, many research groups around the world started investigations to study whether mobile phone use increases the risk of cancer, in particular brain tumors, because the highest RF field is absorbed by the brain when the phone is held to the head. The epidemiological research focused initially on the possibility of risk in middle-aged adults, the population that was the first to use mobile
CONTENTS
Introduction ................................................................................................................................. 243 Mobile Phone Use and RF Exposure Assessment: Self-Reported, Operator Information, and Environmental Exposures ........................................................................... 244 Epidemiological Studies on Brain Tumors: Glioma and Meningioma ................................ 246
Case-Control Studies Show Some Associations but Recall Errors and Biases Are Present .......................................................................................................... 247
Hardell Studies .................................................................................................................. 247 Interphone and Other Case-Control Studies ................................................................ 247
Cohort Studies Do Not Show Associations but Are Limited by Crude Exposure Information ............................................................................................................................. 249 Ecological Studies of Incidence Time Trends ..................................................................... 249
Epidemiological Studies on Vestibular Schwannoma (Acoustic Neuroma) ......................250 Conclusions ..................................................................................................................................250
