Doctors raise questions about health impacts of drilling

http://citizensvoice.com/news/doctors-raise-questions-about-health-impacts-of-drilling-1.1151308#axzz1NGoFQInA

By Laura Legere (Staff Writer)
Published: May 24, 2011

Area physicians brought their questions about the potential health impacts of natural gas drilling to a symposium on the issue Monday night and learned how much about those impacts has yet to be studied.

The Lackawanna County Medical Society sponsored the forum as an introduction to the gas drilling process and its relative risks to drinking and surface water.

Kim Scandale, executive director of the society, said the hope is to address at future sessions some of the unanswered questions raised by the doctors – everything from where to report symptoms potentially related to the drilling to whether there have been epidemiological studies in other gas-drilling states.

Bryan Swistock, water resources extension specialist for Penn State Cooperative Extension and a presenter at the symposium, emphasized the importance of pre- and post-drilling water tests of residential wells. The tests can document any changes to water supplies that might help doctors understand symptoms, he said.

He also detailed the lack of state standards for drinking water wells, which can lead to poor construction and unsafe health conditions even before gas drilling begins.

Doctors in the audience raised concerns about how to determine if symptoms can be connected to nearby drilling, especially since patients’ complaints tend to be “very nebulous, like numbness and joint pain.”

The Northeast Regional Cancer Institute is in the early stages of planning a study of baseline health conditions in the Northern Tier to help measure any health impacts from drilling if they do occur, the center’s medical director and director of research Samuel Lesko, M.D., said.

“At least it will give us some baseline data that might be useful five years or six months from now,” he said.

llegere@timesshamrock.com