Critical Windows of Prenatal Exposure to Cadmium and Size at Birth

doi:10.3390/ijerph14010058

. 2017 Jan 9;14(1):58.

doi: 10.3390/ijerph14010058.

Critical Windows of Prenatal Exposure to Cadmium and Size at Birth

Lu Cheng^{1

2}, Bin Zhang^{3

4

5}, Tongzhang Zheng⁶, Jie Hu^{7

8}, Aifen Zhou⁹, Bryan A Bassig¹⁰, Wei Xia^{11

12}, David A Savitz¹³, Stephen Buka¹⁴, Chao Xiong¹⁵, Joseph M Braun¹⁶, Yaqi Zhang¹⁷, Yanqiu Zhou^{18

19}, Xinyun Pan^{20

21}, Chuansha Wu^{22

23}, Youjie Wang^{24

25}, Zhengmin Qian²⁶, Aimin Yang²⁷, Megan E Romano²⁸, Kunchong Shi²⁹, Shunqing Xu^{30

31}, Yuanyuan Li^{32

33

34}

Affiliations

¹ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. chenglu822@hotmail.com.
² State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. chenglu822@hotmail.com.
³ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. mchwhzb@163.com.
⁴ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. mchwhzb@163.com.
⁵ Women and Children Medical and Healthcare Center of Wuhan, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. mchwhzb@163.com.
⁶ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. tongzhang_zheng@brown.edu.
⁷ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. hujie_tjmu@126.com.
⁸ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. hujie_tjmu@126.com.
⁹ Women and Children Medical and Healthcare Center of Wuhan, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. april1972@163.com.
¹⁰ Department of Environmental Health Sciences, Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, CT 06520, USA. bryan.bassig@nih.gov.
¹¹ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. xiawei@hust.edu.cn.
¹² State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. xiawei@hust.edu.cn.
¹³ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. david_savitz@brown.edu.
¹⁴ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. stephen_buka@brown.edu.
¹⁵ Women and Children Medical and Healthcare Center of Wuhan, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. xcpopo11@yeah.net.
¹⁶ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. joseph_braun_1@brown.edu.
¹⁷ Women and Children Medical and Healthcare Center of Wuhan, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. cardinal3542@hotmail.com.
¹⁸ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. 16483596@life.hkbu.edu.hk.
¹⁹ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. 16483596@life.hkbu.edu.hk.
²⁰ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. panxinyun721@163.com.
²¹ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. panxinyun721@163.com.
²² Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. shalovesafin@126.com.
²³ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. shalovesafin@126.com.
²⁴ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. wangyoujie@mails.tjmu.edu.cn.
²⁵ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. wangyoujie@mails.tjmu.edu.cn.
²⁶ Department of Epidemiology, College for Public Health and Social Justice, Saint Louis University, Saint Louis, MO 63103, USA. zqian2@slu.edu.
²⁷ College of Earth and Environmental Science, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, Gansu, China. aimin_yang@brown.edu.
²⁸ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. megan_romano@brown.edu.
²⁹ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. kunchong_shi@brown.edu.
³⁰ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. xust@hust.edu.cn.
³¹ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. xust@hust.edu.cn.
³² Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. liyuanyuan@hust.edu.cn.
³³ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. liyuanyuan@hust.edu.cn.
³⁴ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. liyuanyuan@hust.edu.cn.

PMID: 28075368
PMCID: PMC5295309
DOI: 10.3390/ijerph14010058

Critical Windows of Prenatal Exposure to Cadmium and Size at Birth

Lu Cheng et al. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2017.

. 2017 Jan 9;14(1):58.

doi: 10.3390/ijerph14010058.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. chenglu822@hotmail.com.
² State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. chenglu822@hotmail.com.
³ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. mchwhzb@163.com.
⁴ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. mchwhzb@163.com.
⁵ Women and Children Medical and Healthcare Center of Wuhan, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. mchwhzb@163.com.
⁶ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. tongzhang_zheng@brown.edu.
⁷ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. hujie_tjmu@126.com.
⁸ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. hujie_tjmu@126.com.
⁹ Women and Children Medical and Healthcare Center of Wuhan, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. april1972@163.com.
¹⁰ Department of Environmental Health Sciences, Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, CT 06520, USA. bryan.bassig@nih.gov.
¹¹ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. xiawei@hust.edu.cn.
¹² State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. xiawei@hust.edu.cn.
¹³ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. david_savitz@brown.edu.
¹⁴ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. stephen_buka@brown.edu.
¹⁵ Women and Children Medical and Healthcare Center of Wuhan, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. xcpopo11@yeah.net.
¹⁶ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. joseph_braun_1@brown.edu.
¹⁷ Women and Children Medical and Healthcare Center of Wuhan, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. cardinal3542@hotmail.com.
¹⁸ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. 16483596@life.hkbu.edu.hk.
¹⁹ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. 16483596@life.hkbu.edu.hk.
²⁰ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. panxinyun721@163.com.
²¹ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. panxinyun721@163.com.
²² Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. shalovesafin@126.com.
²³ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. shalovesafin@126.com.
²⁴ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. wangyoujie@mails.tjmu.edu.cn.
²⁵ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. wangyoujie@mails.tjmu.edu.cn.
²⁶ Department of Epidemiology, College for Public Health and Social Justice, Saint Louis University, Saint Louis, MO 63103, USA. zqian2@slu.edu.
²⁷ College of Earth and Environmental Science, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, Gansu, China. aimin_yang@brown.edu.
²⁸ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. megan_romano@brown.edu.
²⁹ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. kunchong_shi@brown.edu.
³⁰ Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. xust@hust.edu.cn.
³¹ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. xust@hust.edu.cn.
³² Key Laboratory of Environment and Health (HUST), Ministry of Education and Ministry of Environmental Protection, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. liyuanyuan@hust.edu.cn.
³³ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Health (Incubation), School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430000, Hubei, China. liyuanyuan@hust.edu.cn.
³⁴ Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USA. liyuanyuan@hust.edu.cn.

PMID: 28075368
PMCID: PMC5295309
DOI: 10.3390/ijerph14010058

Abstract

Prenatal cadmium (Cd) exposure has been associated with adverse birth outcomes, but the findings of previous studies are inconsistent. We measured Cd concentrations in urine samples at or near 13, 24, and 35 gestational weeks from 282 women in Wuhan, China. We used generalized estimating equation models to assess the associations between maternal creatinine adjusted urinary Cd concentrations at each trimester and birth size. A significant inverse association was observed between higher maternal Cd levels measured during the 1st trimester and birth size in girls. For each log unit increase in Cd (µg/g creatinine) levels from the 1st trimester, there was a decrease in birth weight by 116.99 g (95% confidence interval (CI): -208.87, -25.11 g). The Cd levels from the 1st and 2nd trimesters were also borderline significantly associated with ponderal index in girls. Joint estimation of trimester-specific effects suggested that associations with Cd levels for ponderal index (p_int = 0.02) were significantly different across trimesters, and differences for effects across trimesters for birth weight were marginally significant (p_int = 0.08) in girls. No significant associations were observed between Cd levels from any trimester and birth size in boys. Maternal Cd exposure during earlier periods of pregnancy may have a larger impact on delayed fetal growth.

Keywords: birth weight; cadmium; critical window; epidemiology; fetal exposure.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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References

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[1] Satarug S., Garrett S.H., Sens M.A., Sens D.A. Cadmium, environmental exposure, and health outcomes. Environ. Health Perspect. 2010;118:182–190. doi: 10.1289/ehp.0901234. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

[2] Satarug S., Garrett S.H., Sens M.A., Sens D.A. Cadmium, environmental exposure, and health outcomes. Environ. Health Perspect. 2010;118:182–190. doi: 10.1289/ehp.0901234. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

[3] Adams S.V., Quraishi S.M., Shafer M.M., Passarelli M.N., Freney E.P., Chlebowski R.T., Luo J., Meliker J.R., Mu L., Neuhouser M.L. Dietary cadmium exposure and risk of breast, endometrial, and ovarian cancer in the women′s health initiative. Environ. Health Perspect. 2014;122:594–600. - PMC - PubMed

[4] Adams S.V., Quraishi S.M., Shafer M.M., Passarelli M.N., Freney E.P., Chlebowski R.T., Luo J., Meliker J.R., Mu L., Neuhouser M.L. Dietary cadmium exposure and risk of breast, endometrial, and ovarian cancer in the women′s health initiative. Environ. Health Perspect. 2014;122:594–600. - PMC - PubMed

[5] García-Esquinas E., Pollan M., Tellez-Plaza M., Francesconi K.A., Goessler W., Guallar E., Umans J.G., Yeh J., Best L.G., Navas-Acien A. Cadmium exposure and cancer mortality in a prospective cohort: The strong heart study. Environ. Health Perspect. 2014;122:363–370. doi: 10.1289/ehp.1306587. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

[6] García-Esquinas E., Pollan M., Tellez-Plaza M., Francesconi K.A., Goessler W., Guallar E., Umans J.G., Yeh J., Best L.G., Navas-Acien A. Cadmium exposure and cancer mortality in a prospective cohort: The strong heart study. Environ. Health Perspect. 2014;122:363–370. doi: 10.1289/ehp.1306587. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

[7] Tellez-Plaza M., Navas-Acien A., Menke A., Crainiceanu C.M., Pastor-Barriuso R., Guallar E. Cadmium exposure and all-cause and cardiovascular mortality in the us general population. Environ. Health Perspect. 2012;120:1017–1022. doi: 10.1289/ehp.1104352. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

[8] Tellez-Plaza M., Navas-Acien A., Menke A., Crainiceanu C.M., Pastor-Barriuso R., Guallar E. Cadmium exposure and all-cause and cardiovascular mortality in the us general population. Environ. Health Perspect. 2012;120:1017–1022. doi: 10.1289/ehp.1104352. - DOI - PMC - PubMed

[9] World Health Organization . Arsenic, Metals, Fibres, and Dusts. IARC Monographs on the Evaluation of Carcinogenic Risks to Humans. World Health Organization; Geneva, Switzerland: 2012. - PMC - PubMed

[10] World Health Organization . Arsenic, Metals, Fibres, and Dusts. IARC Monographs on the Evaluation of Carcinogenic Risks to Humans. World Health Organization; Geneva, Switzerland: 2012. - PMC - PubMed

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Critical Windows of Prenatal Exposure to Cadmium and Size at Birth

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Critical Windows of Prenatal Exposure to Cadmium and Size at Birth

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