Association between Maternal Exposure to Chemicals during Pregnancy and the Risk of Foetal Death: The Japan Environment and Children’s Study

Tadao Ooka, Sayaka Horiuchi, Ryoji Shinohara, Reiji Kojima, Yuka Akiyama, Kunio Miyake, Sanae Otawa, Hiroshi Yokomichi, Zentaro Yamagata and on behalf of the Japan Environment and Children’s Study Group
Additional contact information
Tadao Ooka: Department of Health Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Yamanashi, Chuo-shi 409-3898, Yamanashi, Japan
Sayaka Horiuchi: Center for Birth Cohort Studies, University of Yamanashi, Chuo-shi 409-3898, Yamanashi, Japan
Ryoji Shinohara: Center for Birth Cohort Studies, University of Yamanashi, Chuo-shi 409-3898, Yamanashi, Japan
Reiji Kojima: Department of Health Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Yamanashi, Chuo-shi 409-3898, Yamanashi, Japan
Yuka Akiyama: Department of Health Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Yamanashi, Chuo-shi 409-3898, Yamanashi, Japan
Kunio Miyake: Department of Health Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Yamanashi, Chuo-shi 409-3898, Yamanashi, Japan
Sanae Otawa: Center for Birth Cohort Studies, University of Yamanashi, Chuo-shi 409-3898, Yamanashi, Japan
Hiroshi Yokomichi: Department of Health Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Yamanashi, Chuo-shi 409-3898, Yamanashi, Japan
Zentaro Yamagata: Department of Health Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Yamanashi, Chuo-shi 409-3898, Yamanashi, Japan
on behalf of the Japan Environment and Children’s Study Group: Study group members are listed in the Acknowledgments.

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 22, 1-14

Abstract: Scarce knowledge is available on the relationship between maternal chemical exposure during pregnancy and foetal deaths. We studied the association of spontaneous abortions and stillbirths with occupational or daily maternal exposure to chemicals commonly used by pregnant women. Data from the Japan Environment and Children’s Study (JECS), a nationwide prospective birth cohort study, were used. The participants of the study were asked about the frequency of their use of gasoline, pesticides, hair dye, and chlorine bleach during the first and the second to third trimesters of pregnancy. We investigated the relationship between the frequency of the use of chemicals and foetal death. Of the 104,065 foetuses, 923 (0.91%) were spontaneous abortions and 379 (0.37%) were stillbirths. Any type of exposure during the first trimester was not significantly associated with spontaneous abortions. Nevertheless, a more than weekly occupational use of hair dye from the first to the second/third trimester was significantly associated with stillbirth. The results of this study suggest that the frequent use of hair dye during pregnancy can have severe adverse effects on the foetus. These findings can help pregnant women, especially hairdressers, refrain from the continuous use of hair dyes.

Keywords: foetal death; hair dye; stillbirth; spontaneous abortion; pregnancy; maternal exposure; chemical exposure; hairdressers (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/22/11748/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/22/11748/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:22:p:11748-:d:675213

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().