Health Highlights: Sept. 29, 2009

• EPA Warns About PCBs in School Window/Door Caulking
• Sentate Committee Discusses Dietary Supplements Regulation
• Food Workers Heaviest Smokers: Study
• Hundreds More Nursing Homes Candidates for Inspection: Report
• Switch to Digital Patient Records Driven by Big Hospitals

Here are some of the latest health and medical news developments, compiled by editors of HealthDay:

EPA Warns About PCBs in School Window/Door Caulking

Schools across the United States need to check window and door caulking to see if it contains potentially cancer-causing PCBs, says the Environmental Protection Agency. If significant amounts of PCBs are found, the caulking should be removed.

Although an exact number isn't known, PCBs may be present in many schools that were built or renovated before the chemicals were banned in the late 1970s, said EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, according to the Associated Press. The danger to students is uncertain.

"We're concerned about the potential risks associated with exposure to these PCBs, and we're recommending practical, common sense steps to reduce this exposure as we improve our understanding of the science," Jackson said in a news release.

The agency plans to conduct research into the link between PCBs in caulk and in the air and will conduct tests on PCBs in schools, the AP reported. The EPA has set up a PCBs-in-caulk hot line (1-888-835-5372) and Web site at www.epa.gov/pcbsincaulk.

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Senate Committee Discusses Dietary Supplements Regulation

Government regulation of dietary supplements will be discussed at a U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Tuesday. The issue is being looked at because steroids and other banned substances are turning up in over-the-counter bodybuilding products.

The dietary supplements industry was deregulated by Congress in 1994.

"We're looking at whether there's adequate protection for consumers from getting these supplements, which have steroids or steroid-like substances," Sen. Arlen Specter, D.-Pa., who convened the committee hearing, told the Associated Press. "These tainted products can cause life-threatening injuries, such as kidney failure and liver injury."

The lack of dietary supplement regulation is a major problem for amateur and professional athletes who use OTC supplements, because they can be suspended if they test positive for a banned substance, said Don Fehr, head of the Major League Baseball Players Association.

"Players, like everyone else, have no idea what they're taking," Fehr told the AP. "I'm sure there are some good supplement products in the market that are safe, effective and accurately identified. I hope these products can be protected. But as of now, there is no way a player or anyone else can know with certainty that what they are taking is accurately described on the label."

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Food Workers Heaviest Smokers: Study

Food preparation and food serving workers are the heaviest smokers among people with full-time jobs, according to a new U.S. report.

The study of 2006-08 data found that 33.6 million full-time employees ages 18-64 smoked cigarettes in the past month.

Smoking was reported by 44.7 percent of food preparation/serving workers, followed by 42.9 percent of construction and mining/extraction workers. The lowest smoking rates were among people in education, training and library occupations (12.3 percent) and those who worked in the life, physical and social sciences area (15.4 percent), according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration study.

Among the other findings:

• Unemployed people ages 18 to 64 had a much higher percentage of past-month cigarette use than full-time workers -- 45.4 percent vs. 28 percent.
• Among full-time workers, the rate of past month smoking was higher among those ages 18 to 25 (40.1 percent) than those ages 26 to 34 (33.9 percent), ages 35 to 49 (26.7 percent), and ages 50 to 64 (20.7 percent).
• Overall, men with full-time jobs were more likely than women to have smoked in the past month, but women with community and social services, healthcare, and technical occupations had higher smoking rates than men in those occupations.