Environmental exposure to residential pesticides, chemicals, dusts, fumes, and metals, and risk of childhood germ cell tumors

Abstract

We examined relationships between exposure to residential pesticides, chemicals, dusts, fumes, and metals, and childhood germ cell tumors (GCTs) in the largest case-control study to date on the topic. We recruited 272 children under 15 years old who had GCT diagnosed between January 1, 1993 and December 31, 2001. Controls were selected by random-digit dialing and were frequency matched to cases by sex, age, and geographic area. Telephone interviews and self-administered questionnaires of parents were used to collect exposure information. We used unconditional logistic regression to estimate odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI). Maternal and paternal exposure from 6 months before pregnancy to during breastfeeding and children's postnatal exposure to residential pesticides were generally unrelated to risk of childhood GCT. Elevated OR were observed for mothers’ exposure to hair dyes 1 month before pregnancy for boys (OR=1.7, 95% CI=1.0–2.8) and during breastfeeding for boys and girls combined, and for girls (OR=1.5, 95% CI=1.0–2.2 and OR=1.7, 95% CI=1.1–2.6, respectively). Among boys, OR for paternal exposure to insecticides more often than four times or exposure to indoor insecticides more often than three times were 0.5 (95% CI=0.2–0.9, trend test p = 0.05 ) and 0.3 (95% CI=0.2–0.8, trend test p = 0.02 ) during the index pregnancy. Overall this study produced no strong evidence linking parental and child residential exposure to pesticides, certain chemicals, dusts, fumes, and metals to increased risk of childhood GCT. Statistically significant associations need to be confirmed in future studies.