Occupational Exposures and Reproductive Effects among Women in the AGRICAN Cohort

Abstract

Background/Aim: Agricultural exposures have been associated with several negative effects on fertility, pregnancy and child development. Our aim was to study the course of the last pregnancy of women enrolled in the French AGRICAN cohort. Methods: AGRICAN cohort was initiated in 2005-2007 and enrolled about 180,000 people affiliated to the French health insurance for agriculture. More than 1,100 women reported at least one pregnancy since 2005 and received a questionnaire in order to collect data about last pregnancy, lifestyle and some occupational exposures. Women who worked on farm during pregnancy were interviewed by phone to collect data about agricultural activities and tasks performed. Results: Approximatively 70% of women returned the questionnaire. Less than 12% smoked during pregnancy and 70% attained more than high school's degree. At enrollment 44% had ever worked on a farm (cattle breeding and vineyard predominantly) mainly as farmworkers. About 90% worked during their pregnancy, including one third on a farm, 42% performed administrative tasks and less than 4% reported pesticide use during pregnancy. For about 36%, the husband worked on a farm during pregnancy and 25% used pesticides. For the last pregnancy, 17% of women reported time to pregnancy longer than 12 months. There were 86% of single live births and about 4% spontaneous abortions. Among non-preterm single births (more than 90% of live births), the means birthweight, birth height, head circumference were approximately 3,400g (SD=0.44) with 2.3% below 2,500g, 50cm (SD=2.3) and 35cm (SD=1.6) respectively. Less than 1% had Apgar score below 8 at 5 minutes. Congenital abnormalities were reported in less than 3% of live births. Conclusions: Our study provides original results about reproductive effects of agricultural work in France. Further analyses are needed to measured effects of agricultural tasks. This is the first stage of development of a prospective mother-child cohort in AGRICAN.