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UNITED STATES ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY'S ENVIRONMENTAL INDICATORS INITIATIVE AND BIOMARKERS DATABASE
Citation:
LOBDELL, D. T. UNITED STATES ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY'S ENVIRONMENTAL INDICATORS INITIATIVE AND BIOMARKERS DATABASE. Presented at Environmental Cancer Risk, Nutrition and Individual Susceptibility (ECNIS) Annual Meeting, Maastricht, NETHERLANDS, February 26, 2007.
Impact/Purpose:
research results
Description:
Within the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA), there are several on-going programs and projects that collect health and environmental information. The USEPA's Environmental Indicators Initiative is one such program which includes the development of environmental public health indicators. Another example is a biomarkers database that was created for study planners of the National Children's Study. This presentation will outline both examples by highlighting the biomarkers and health information that has and will be collected over time for indicators development as well as describing the existing literature based biomarkers database that includes cancer as a search term. . The USEPA has recently published two different indicators reports: America's Children and the Environment (ACE) and the Draft Report on the Environment. Both reports are available for download (see: http://www.epa.gov/indicators/ and http://www.epa.gov/envirohealth/children/). The recently updated web site for ACE highlights trends in environmental contaminant levels in air, water, food, and soil; concentrations of contaminants measured in the bodies of children and women; and childhood illnesses and health conditions such as childhood cancer that may be influenced by exposure to environmental contaminants. In June 2003, USEPA published its first ever national Draft Report on the Environment (ROE), using available indicators and data to answer questions pertaining to national environmental and human health conditions. It was developed as the first step in the Environmental Indicators Initiative. To expand on the work that was begun with this draft report, an update will be released late in 2007. An interactive website is being developed as part of this initiative where data used in the report will be accessible for researchers to download. Both reports contain information on cancer trends within the United States as well as biomonitoring information. The National Children's Study (NCS) is a federally-sponsored, longitudinal study of environmental influences on the health and development of children across the United States. Current plans are to study approximately 100,000 children and their families beginning before birth up to age 21 years. To explore potential biomarkers that could be important measurements in the NCS, we compiled the relevant scientific literature to identify both routine or standardized biological markers as well as new and emerging biological markers. The database can be accessed at the following website: http://cfpub2.epa.qov/ncea/cfm/recordisplay.cfm?deid=85844. Although the search criteria encouraged examination of factors that influence the breadth of child health and development, attention was primarily focused on exposure, susceptibility and outcome biomarkers associated with four important child health outcomes: autism and neurobehavioral disorders, injury, cancer and asthma. We anticipate this database will have applicability for the NCS as well as other studies of children's environmental health. (This is an abstract of a proposed presentation and does not necessarily reflect EPA policy.)