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National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences

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Your Environment. Your Health.

Publication Detail

Title: Maternal exposure to PM2.5 during pregnancy and asthma risk in early childhood: consideration of phases of fetal lung development.

Authors: Hazlehurst, Marnie F; Carroll, Kecia N; Loftus, Christine T; Szpiro, Adam A; Moore, Paul E; Kaufman, Joel D; Kirwa, Kipruto; LeWinn, Kaja Z; Bush, Nicole R; Sathyanarayana, Sheela; Tylavsky, Frances A; Barrett, Emily S; Nguyen, Ruby H N; Karr, Catherine J

Published In Environ Epidemiol, (2021 Apr)

Abstract: BACKGROUND: Increasingly studies suggest prenatal exposure to air pollution may increase risk of childhood asthma. Few studies have investigated exposure during specific fetal pulmonary developmental windows. OBJECTIVE: To assess associations between prenatal fine particulate matter exposure and asthma at age 4. METHODS: This study included mother-child dyads from two pregnancy cohorts-CANDLE and TIDES-within the ECHO-PATHWAYS consortium (births in 2007-2013). Three child asthma outcomes were parent-reported: ever asthma, current asthma, and current wheeze. Fine particulate matter (PM2.5) exposures during the pseudoglandular (5-16 weeks gestation), canalicular (16-24 weeks gestation), saccular (24-36 weeks gestation), and alveolar (36+ weeks gestation) phases of fetal lung development were estimated using a national spatiotemporal model. We estimated associations with Poisson regression with robust standard errors, and adjusted for child, maternal, and neighborhood factors. RESULTS: Children (n=1469) were on average 4.3 (standard deviation 0.5) years old, 49% were male, and 11.7% had ever asthma; 46% of women identified as black and 53% had at least a college/technical school degree. A 2 μg/m3 higher PM2.5 exposure during the saccular phase was associated with 1.29 times higher risk of ever asthma (95% CI: 1.06-1.58). A similar association was observed with current asthma (RR 1.27, 95% CI: 1.04-1.54), but not current wheeze (RR 1.11, 95% CI: 0.92-1.33). Effect estimates for associations during other developmental windows had confidence intervals that included the null. CONCLUSIONS: Later phases of prenatal lung development may be particularly sensitive to the developmental toxicity of PM2.5.

PubMed ID: 33709049 Exiting the NIEHS site

MeSH Terms: No MeSH terms associated with this publication

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