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Assessment of chronic exposure to cigarette smoke and its change during pregnancy by segmental analysis of maternal hair nicotine

Journal of Exposure Science & Environmental Epidemiology volume 13, pages 144–151 (2003)Cite this article

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate the association between biomarkers of fetal exposure to smoking during the whole pregnancy, nicotine in maternal and newborns hair samples, and quantitative measurement of smoking intake and exposure evaluated by maternal self-reported questionnaire. Study subjects were 150 mothers and their newborns from a hospital in Barcelona. A questionnaire including smoking habits was completed in the third trimester of pregnancy and on the day of delivery. Nicotine content was measured in two subsequent segments of maternal hair accounting for the first and last months of pregnancy, and in fetal hair. The geometric mean of nicotine concentration in maternal hair discriminated between nonexposition (3.84 and 2.80 ng/mg in distal and proximal hair segment, respectively) and exposition to cigarette smoke during pregnancy (6.06 and 4.30 ng/mg in distal and proximal hair segment, respectively) (P<0.05), and between these two classes and active smoking (14.40 and 11.08 ng/mg in distal and proximal hair segment, respectively). Maternal hair nicotine was able to differentiate levels of exposure to tobacco smoke and levels of intake. Nicotine concentration in hair from newborns did not differentiate between exposure and nonexposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) in nonsmoking mothers. Finally, chronic exposure to cigarette smoke during pregnancy, assessed by maternal hair nicotine, correlated negatively with anthropometric parameters of newborns.

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Acknowledgements

This study was supported by Grant FIS 95/0314. None of the authors has any conflict of interest in connection with the paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Clinical Biochemistry Dept. Istituto Superiore di Sanità, Roma, Italy

    Simona Pichini & Roberta Pacifici

  2. Pharmacological Research Unit, Institut Municipal d' Investigació Mèdica, Barcelona, Spain

    Simona Pichini, José Antonio Pascual & David Diaz

  3. Paediatric Service, Hospital del Mar, Barcelona, Spain

    Óscar Garcia-Algar, Oriol Vall & Cecilia Figueroa

  4. Respiratory and Environmental Research Unit, Institut Municipal d' Investigació Mèdica, Barcelona, Spain

    Laura Muñoz & Jordi Sunyer

  5. Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Spain

    José Antonio Pascual

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  1. Simona Pichini
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  2. Óscar Garcia-Algar
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  3. Laura Muñoz
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  4. Oriol Vall
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  5. Roberta Pacifici
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  9. Jordi Sunyer
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Correspondence to Jordi Sunyer.

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Pichini, S., Garcia-Algar, Ó., Muñoz, L. et al. Assessment of chronic exposure to cigarette smoke and its change during pregnancy by segmental analysis of maternal hair nicotine. J Expo Sci Environ Epidemiol 13, 144–151 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.jea.7500264

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.jea.7500264

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