Grantee Research Project Results

A key feature of the Center for Child Environmental Health Risks Research is the Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) Project, which identifies the multiple potential pathways that may contribute to pesticide exposure in adults and children living in agricultural communities. Unlike many other studies of potential pesticide exposure, the CBPR investigators have used a group randomized trial design. Advantages of such an approach are the potential to reach large numbers of people, disseminate messages about behavior across a diverse population, change community norms about behavior, and integrate new behavioral practices into existing community structures and organizations. Part of the study design requires involvement from the communities to guide us in planning intervention activities. The results of this research support the hypothesis that the take-home exposure pathway contributes to residential pesticide contamination in agricultural homes where young children are present.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Public Health paradigm "V-diagram" frames and integrates the UW Center's research efforts.

 

The highlights of this past year include successful recruitment of families, completion of the data collection components of the thinning season (such as a baseline and a follow-up questionnaire, activity and diet diary, urine, blood, buccal cell, house and vehicle dust samples and using indoor and outdoor air monitors and deposition plates) and collection of hair/saliva for the Cortisol and Stress Study. Specifically, during this past year we were able to re-establish contact with 100 households (60 farmworker and 40 non-farmworker families) from previous CHC cohorts (51 farmworker and 40 non-farmworker families were recruited from CHC-2 cohort [2003-2010] and 9 from CHC-1 cohort [1998-2003]). A total of 132 farmworkers and 90 non- farm workers were re-contacted before reaching the goal of 60 farmworker and 40 non-farmworker households. Given that this is a highly mobile population, it is significant that we were able to recruit 100 cohort members to participate in our current study. Further, they have all consented to participate in the three data collection periods of the pre-thinning, thinning, and non-spray season. Importantly, we were able to collect urine, buccal cells, 3-Day Diet Survey and 7-Day Activity Diary on all 60 referent farmworkers' children (who are now between 7 and 12 years of age). Furthermore, we were able to collect blood samples from all but 5 of the 60 referent children. Similarly, for referent non-farmworkers' children, we were able to collect all needed samples on all 40 children except for two blood samples. For adults, we were able to collect all needed samples on all 60 farmworker adults except for one Day-5 urine and two vehicle dust samples. We were able to collect all samples on all 40 non-farmworker adults. We also collected indoor and outdoor air samples so we can better understand the influence of drift by proximity to spray events. Finally, we recruited 27 Hispanic farmworker and non-farmworker women who also are current participants in the CHC-3 study to further participate in the Cortisol and Stress study. These women are ages 18-49 and are neither currently pregnant nor taking any corticosteroid treatment. We have completed sample collection of hair and saliva for 15 participants.