Second-Hand Tobacco Smoke Exposure in Various US Occupations (NHANES 2007–08): Assessment Using Serum Cotinine and Urinary Total NNAL

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Second-Hand Tobacco Smoke Exposure in Various US Occupations (NHANES 2007–08): Assessment Using Serum Cotinine and Urinary Total NNALAbstract Number:2127 Binnian Wei*, John T. Bernert, Benjamin C. Blount, Connie S. Sosnoff, and Lanqing Wang Binnian Wei* Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, United States, E-mail Address: [email protected] Search for more papers by this author , John T. Bernert Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, United States, E-mail Address: [email protected] Search for more papers by this author , Benjamin C. Blount Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, United States, E-mail Address: [email protected] Search for more papers by this author , Connie S. Sosnoff Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, United States, E-mail Address: [email protected] Search for more papers by this author , and Lanqing Wang Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, United States, E-mail Address: [email protected] Search for more papers by this author AbstractBackground: Our previous study using serum cotinine has shown that second-hand smoke (SHS) exposure varied significantly among different occupations. Urinary 4-(methylnitrosamino)-1-(3-pyridyl)-1-butanol (NNAL), a major metabolite of the tobacco-specific carcinogen 4-(methylnitrosamino)-1-(3-pyridyl)-1-butanone (NNK), has an excretion half-life of 10–18 days. Thus urinary NNAL could reflect a relatively longer SHS exposure interval compared to serum cotinine which has an half-life of only about 16 hours.Objectives: The objective of this study is to describe the total urinary NNAL concentrations among US occupations.Methods: Samples came from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 2007-2008. Nonsmokers were those participants with serum cotinine <=10 ng/mL, aged 18 and above.Results: For total urinary NNAL, non-smoking workers in legal and scientific occupations had the lowest geometric mean (GM) values of 0.56 and 0.57 ng/g creatinine, respectively, while the food preparation/serving occupation had the highest GM of 1.47 ng/g creatinine, followed by installation/maintenance/repair workers (1.24). Those two occupations were 79% and 51%, respectively, higher than the GM (0.82 ng/g creatinine) for all occupation groups. For serum cotinine, the lowest GM values were found in legal (0.018 ng/mL) and education/training/library (0.018 ng/mL) occupations, while the highest GM values were again identified in food preparation/serving (0.096 ng/mL) and installation/maintenance/repair (0.081 ng/mL) occupations. Those two occupations had 148% and 109% higher serum cotinine, respectively, compared to GM for all occupation groups (0.039 ng/mL).Conclusions: Occupations that had the highest total urinary levels of the tobacco-specific carcinogen NNAL were consistent with those found to have the highest serum cotinine levels. Targeted efforts may be needed to decrease SHS for those occupations, especially within food preparation/service workplaces.