Journal Article Epublish
PubMed: 40520483 DOI: 10.1097/EE9.0000000000000402
Association between gestational environmental chemical mixtures and folate exposures with autistic behaviors in a Canadian birth cohort.
Environ Epidemiol 9(4):e402
Authors: Joshua D Alampi, Bruce P Lanphear, Amanda J MacFarlane, Joseph M Braun, Youssef Oulhote, Jillian Ashley-Martin, Tye E Arbuckle, Aimin Chen, Gina Muckle, Lawrence C McCandless
Affiliations
- Faculty of Health Sciences, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada.
- Texas A&M Agriculture, Food, and Nutrition Evidence Center, Fort Worth, Texas.
- Nutrition Research Division, Health Canada, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.
- Department of Epidemiology, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island.
- Department of Environmental Medicine and Public Health, Icahn school of medicine at Mount Sinai, New York City, New York.
- Environmental Health Science and Research Bureau, Healthy Environments and Consumer Safety Branch, Health Canada, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.
- Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Informatics, University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
- Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Québec Research Centre and School of Psychology, Laval University, Québec City, Québec, Canada.
Abstract
Background
Prenatal exposure to environmental chemicals may be associated with autism or autistic-like behaviors. Previous studies suggest that these associations are stronger when folic acid (FA) supplementation is lower.
Methods
We used data from the Maternal-Infant Research on Environmental Chemicals study, a Canadian pregnancy and birth cohort (2008-2011). We considered five separate chemical mixtures (measured during the first trimester of pregnancy): metals, organochlorine pesticides, per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and persistent organic pollutants (POPs; including organochlorine pesticides, PFAS, PCBs, and one polybrominated diphenyl ether congener). Autistic-like behaviors were documented in 601 3-4-year-old children with the social responsiveness scale-2 (SRS-2), where higher T-scores denote more behaviors. We used quantile g-computation to estimate the mixture-SRS-2 associations and assessed whether gestational FA supplementation and plasma total folate concentrations modified these associations.
Results
The PFAS mixture was associated with decreased SRS-2 T-scores (Ψ = -0.5; 95% confidence interval [CI] = -1.1, 0.1). The metal-SRS-2 associations were stronger in the positive direction among participants with high (>1,000 μg/d) FA supplementation (Ψ = 2.4; 95% CI = 0.8, 3.9) versus those with adequate (400-1,000 μg/d) supplementation (Ψ = -0.2; 95% CI = -1.1, 0.7) (p-interaction = 0.003). Plasma total folate concentrations similarly modified these associations (p-interaction = 0.01). The associations between the PFAS, PCB, and POP mixtures and SRS-2 T-scores were stronger in the positive direction among participants with low (<400 μg/d) versus adequate FA supplementation. This was not observed when assessing modification by plasma total folate concentrations.
Conclusion
Our results suggest that the metal mixture is more strongly associated with autistic-like behaviors among participants with higher folate exposure, and the PFAS, PCB, and POP mixtures are more strongly associated with autistic-like behaviors among participants with low FA supplementation.
MeSH
Ether, Pregnancy, Parturition, Pesticides, Plasma