Table 1A: Characteristics of the inception cohort, restricted to the 1352 coal miners with lung function measurements after exposure onset.
| N (%) | mean | sd | min | max | |
| Age at entry to FU (yrs) | 1352 | 20.4 | 5.0 | 14 | 50 |
| Age at end of FU (yrs) | 1352 | 40.1 | 8.6 | 16 | 60 |
| Number of lung function measurements | 1352 | 11.7 | 5.3 | 1 | 26 |
| BMI at entry | 1352 | 22.7 | 3.3 | 15.1 | 41.1 |
| BMI at end of FU | 1352 | 27.2 | 4.6 | 16.4 | 67.8 |
| Smoking status and pack years at entry to FU | |||||
| Current smoker, N (%) | 425 (31) | 3.6 | 4.0 | 0.1 | 52 |
| Former smoker, N (%) | 4 (0.3) | 5.9 | 5.1 | 3.0 | 13.5 |
| Never smoker, N (%) | 923 (68) | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Smoking status and pack years at end of FU | |||||
| Current smoker, N (%) | 675 (50) | 15.9 | 10.2 | 0.1 | 52.5 |
| Former smoker, N (%) | 322 (24) | 11.8 | 9.2 | 0.3 | 84.0 |
| Never smoker, N (%) | 355 (26) | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Nationality | |||||
| German, N (%) | 1168 (85) | ||||
| Other, N (%) | 201 (15) | ||||
FU: Follow-up; sd: Standard deviation; min: Minimum; max: Maximum.