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Table 3 Associations between RF-EMF exposures and ‘Tinnitus’ (symptom)

From: The relationship between adolescents’ well-being and their wireless phone use: a cross-sectional study

Symptom Symptom categories (N for unadjusted model/N for adjusted model) Exposure Exposure categories (N for unadjusted model/N for adjusted model) UnadjustedOR (95% CI) for each exposure category Adjusted OR (95% CI) for each exposure category Confounders in model
Tinnitus No, hardly ever (-/194) Cordless calls >10 minutes weekly 0 (-/61) Model invalid 1 Cold/flu**+
1 or 2 times weekly (-/73) 1-2 (-/102) 1.05 (0.75-1.49) Use headset for calls*+
3 or 4 times weekly (-/27) 3-9 (-/79) 0.70 (0.48-1.01) Decile (SES)
Most of the time (-/27)) 10-120 (-/79) 1.05 (0.73-1.52)
Tinnitus No, hardly ever (-/207) Minutes on cordless phone daily 0-4 (-/141) Model invalid 1 Cold/flu+
1-4 times weekly (-/101) 5-15 (-/100) 0.86 (0.64-1.13) Decile-
Most days (-/28) 16-240 (-/95) 1.03 (0.76-1.39) Woken by phone
Use headset for calls
Tinnitus‡ No, hardly ever (-/84 ) Minutes on cordless phone daily 0-4 (-/72) Model invalid 1 Cold/flu*+
1 or 2 times weekly (-/35) 5-15 (-/45) 0.60 (0.25-1.42) Use headset for calls*
3 or 4 times weekly (-/8) including 16-240 (-/21) 0.96 (0.33-2.76) Cordless phone frequency
Most of the time (-/11)
Cordless phone frequency Not exposed 1 Age
≤ 900 MHz 7.13 (1.5-33.7)
1.8-1.9 GHz 7.32 (1.9-28.4)*
2.4 GHz 3.56 (0.95-13.4)
5.8 GHz 4.39 (0.99-19.5)
Tinnitus No, hardly ever (-/88) Cordless phone frequency Not exposed (30/27) Model invalid 1 Cold/flu*+
1 or 2 times weekly (-/36) ≤ 900 MHz (20/19) 4.10 (1.03-16.28) Use cellphone headset+
3 or 4 times weekly (-/9) 1.8-1.9 GHz (28/27) 4.70 (1.34-16.43)
Most of the time (12/11) 2.4 GHz (54/53) 2.46 (0.77-7.86)
5.8 GHz (18/18) 3.83 (0.99-14.82)
Tinnitus No, hardly ever (217/213) Cellphone calls >10 minutes weekly 0 (275/270) 1 1 Cold/flu*+
1 or 2 times weekly (79/77) 1-6 (65/65) 1.24 (0.92-1.66) 1.21 (0.90-1.64) Use of earpiece+
3 or 4 times weekly (26/26) 7-35 (12/11) 2.00 (1.01-3.94) 1.56 (0.73-3.35) Decile-
Most of the time (30/30)
Tinnitus No, hardly ever (-/220) Cellphone headset No (-/327) Model invalid 1 Cold/flu*+
1 or 2 times weekly (-/79) Wired (-/16) 1.80 (1.00-3.26) Decile
3 or 4 times weekly (-/27) Wireless (-/13) 1.61 (0.85-3.05)
  Most of the time (-/30)      
  1. Bold font Sig. p < 0.05; *Sig. p ≤ 0.01; **Sig. p ≤ 0.001; + positive association; - negative association; ‡ Previous model recalculated including cordless phone frequency (see text); ‘Model invalid’ means it did not meet the criteria outlined in the methods.
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