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RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN AIR QUALITY AND SELECTED CARDIAC DEFECTS AND ORAL CLEFTS, TEXAS, 1997-2000
Citation:
GILBOA, S., P. MENDOLA, A. F. OLSHAN, P. LANGLOIS, D. SAVITZ, D. P. LOOMIS, A. H. HERRING, AND D. E. FIXLER. RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN AIR QUALITY AND SELECTED CARDIAC DEFECTS AND ORAL CLEFTS, TEXAS, 1997-2000. Presented at Society for Epidemiologic Research Annual Meeting, Toronto, ON, CANADA, June 28 - 30, 2005.
Description:
One previous study of air quality and birth defects reported associations between carbon monoxide and ozone exposures and selected cardiac defects. To corroborate these results the authors investigated the association between maternal exposures to carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide, ozone, sulfur dioxide, and PM during weeks three through eight of pregnancy and the risk of selected cardiac birth defects and oral clefts among live births and fetal deaths between 1997 and 2000 in seven Texas counties. Cases were selected from the Texas Birth Defects Registry (n=4570). Non-malformed controls were sampled from vital records and frequency matched to cases on year of birth, vital status, and maternal county of residence at delivery (n=3667). United States Environmental Protection Agency stationary monitoring data were used to estimate air pollution exposures. The risks for eight clinical diagnostic groupings and nine individual birth defects were analyzed. Unconditional binary and polytomous logistic regression models were used to adjust for covariates available in the vital record. Comparing the highest quartile of exposure to the lowest, there were positive associations between carbon monoxide and tetralogy of Fallot (odds ratio (OR) = 2.04; 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.26, 3.29), PM and isolated atrial septal defects (OR = 2.27; 95% CI: 1.43, 3.60), and sulfur dioxide and isolated ventricular septal defects (OR = 2.16; 95% CI: 1.51, 3.09). Inverse associations were found between nitrogen dioxide and ventricular septal defects and between sulfur dioxide and isolated atrial septal defects. This study does not provide strong evidence that air pollution increases the risk of birth defects although these results supported one previously reported positive finding with ozone. This is an abstract of a proposed presentation and does not necessarily reflect EPA policy.