Left Side of Truck Driver’s Face Ages Decades Faster Than Right Side

http://wepartypatriots.com/wp/2012/06/04/should-trucking-companies-be-required-to-supply-sunscreen/

Left Side of Truck Driver’s Face Ages Decades Faster Than Right Side. Should Trucking Companies Be Required to Supply Sunscreen?



When one thinks of the occupational hazards related to truck driving, skin cancer does not immediately come to mind. Crashes related to sleep deprivation, emotional trauma, even back pain and blood clots seem more likely on the surface.

But anyone who has taken a long road trip only to find their left arm badly burned upon arrival might be able to offer a different perspective. Prolonged exposure to the sun’s rays can have seriously negative effects. Dermatologists Jennifer R.S. Gordon and Joaquin C. Brieva recently did a study on dermatoheliosis — or “photoaging” — that included a 69-year old trucker as a case study. The results were published in the New England Journal of Medicine and blogged about by Gizmodo:

A 69-year-old man presented with a 25-year history of gradual, asymptomatic thickening and wrinkling of the skin on the left side of his face. The physical examination showed hyperkeratosis with accentuated ridging, multiple open comedones, and areas of nodular elastosis. Histopathological analysis showed an accumulation of elastolytic material in the dermis and the formation of milia within the vellus hair follicles. Findings were consistent with the Favre–Racouchot syndrome of photodamaged skin, known as dermatoheliosis.

The patient reported that he had driven a delivery truck for 28 years. Ultraviolet A (UVA) rays transmit through window glass, penetrating the epidermis and upper layers of dermis. Chronic UVA exposure can result in thickening of the epidermis and stratum corneum, as well as destruction of elastic fibers. This photoaging effect of UVA is contrasted with photocarcinogenesis.

FULL story at link.