Rate My Professor Deborah Glass

Professor Deborah Glass is a Professor at Monash University, specializing in occupational and environmental health within the School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine. She graduated in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University in 1974, obtained a teaching qualification from Leicester University in 1975, a Masters in Occupational Health and Hygiene in 1979/80, and completed a PhD with Deakin University in 1999 based on exposure assessment work. Following her teaching qualification, she taught for four years before working in industry as an occupational hygienist, performing sampling in pharmaceuticals, agrochemicals, asbestos, noise assessments, biological monitoring, and surface sampling. In 1985, she joined the Institute of Occupational Health at the University of Birmingham, advancing to Lecturer in Occupational Hygiene in 1989. Midway through 1995, she contributed to Health Watch, a prospective cohort study of petroleum industry workers then based at the University of Melbourne. She joined Monash University in 1998, where she continues to work in exposure assessment for epidemiology, focusing on areas such as the petroleum industry, firefighters, coal mine workers, benzene exposure, and leukemia risks.

Her research has profoundly influenced occupational health, amassing over 6,600 citations according to Google Scholar. Notable publications include 'Leukemia risk associated with low-level benzene exposure' (Epidemiology, 2003), 'Carcinogenicity of occupational exposure as a firefighter' (The Lancet Oncology, 2022), 'Myelodysplastic syndrome and benzene exposure among petroleum workers: an international pooled analysis' (Journal of the National Cancer Institute, 2012), 'Hypotheses for mechanisms linking shiftwork and cancer' (Medical Hypotheses, 2011), and 'Night shift work and breast cancer: a pooled analysis of population-based case-control studies with complete work history' (European Journal of Epidemiology, 2018). Deborah Glass became a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Occupational Hygienists (FAIOH) in 2008. She serves as assistant editor of the Annals of Occupational Hygiene since 2010 and an invited member of its International Advisory Committee since 2009. Her committee contributions include the ACGIH Threshold Limit Value committee since 2006, founding membership of the Occupational Cancer Risk Working Party of The Cancer Council Australia since 2007, various leadership roles in the Australian Institute of Occupational Hygienists such as past Council member and Education Committee Chair, and participation in three IARC monograph meetings on industrial chemicals, benzene, opium, and firefighters.