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Temporal trends of lipophilic persistent organic pollutants in serum from Danish nulliparous pregnant women 2011–2013

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An Erratum to this article was published on 14 June 2017

Abstract

The use of the lipophilic persistent organic pollutants (POPs) including polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and several organochlorine pesticides (OCPs) has been prohibited for more than 30 years. In this study, we present the temporal trends of the lipophilic POP serum concentrations in Danish nulliparous pregnant women between 2011 and 2013. We randomly selected 197 pregnant women (gestational age 11–13) from the Aarhus Birth Cohort. The concentrations of the lipophilic POPs in the serum samples were analyzed using gas chromatography. The concentrations were corrected for total serum lipids. The statistical analysis was performed by regression analysis with adjustment for age, BMI, gestational age at blood draw, and smoking status. The serum concentrations of PCB 118, 138, 153, 156, 170, 180, 187, and hexachlorobenzen, trans-nonachlor, β-hexachlorocyclohexane (β-HCH), and p,p’-dichlorodiphenyldichloroethylene were lower in 2013 than in 2011. However, the oxychlordane concentration was lowest in 2011. The serum levels of most lipophilic POPs followed downward trends during the study period, which was expected, as these compounds has been banned for many years. The upward trend of oxychlordane was unexpected and presumably a chance finding.

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Abbreviations

AMAP:

Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme

BMI:

Body mass index

CI:

Confidence interval

DDE:

Dichlorodiphenyldichloroethylene

DDT:

Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane

HCB:

Hexachlorobenzene

HCH:

Hexachlorocyclohexane

LOQ:

Limit of quantification

OCP:

Organochlorine pesticide

PFAA:

Perfluorinated alkyl acid

PBB:

Polybrominated biphenyl

PBDE:

Polybrominated diphenyl ether

PCB:

Polychlorinated biphenyl

POP:

Persistent organic pollutant

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Acknowledgement

We thank our fellow researchers of the FETOTOX Project (http://www.fetotox.au.dk) for their contributions to the work. In addition, we want to acknowledge the work of the team at the Centre de Toxicologie, Institute National de Santé Publique du Québec, Québec, Canada, who carried out the quantitative chemical analysis. The study was supported by the Danish Council for Strategic Research (Grant No. 10-092818). The funding sources were not involved in the research activities. The Aarhus Birth Cohort Biobank was funded by a grant from the Danish National Research Foundation with additional support from Tryg Fonden and Aarhus University Research Foundation.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Arctic Health & Molecular Epidemiology, Department of Public Health, Aarhus University, Bartholins Allé 2, Build. 1260, DK-8000, Aarhus C, Denmark

    Christian Bjerregaard-Olesen, Manhai Long, Mandana Ghisari & Eva C Bonefeld-Jørgensen

  2. Section for Epidemiology, Department of Public Health, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark

    Bodil H Bech & Jørn Olsen

  3. Research Unit for Gynaecology and Obstetrics, Institute of Clinical Research, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark

    Ellen A Nohr

  4. Department of Clinical Medicine-Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Aarhus University Hospital, Skejby, Denmark

    Niels Uldbjerg

  5. Perinatal Epidemiology Research Unit, Aarhus University Hospital, Skejby, Denmark

    Tine B Henriksen

  6. Department of Pediatrics, Aarhus University Hospital, Skejby, Denmark

    Tine B Henriksen

Authors
  1. Christian Bjerregaard-Olesen
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  2. Manhai Long
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  3. Mandana Ghisari
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  4. Bodil H Bech
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  7. Tine B Henriksen
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  8. Jørn Olsen
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  9. Eva C Bonefeld-Jørgensen
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Eva C Bonefeld-Jørgensen.

Additional information

Responsible editor: Hongwen Sun

In the second paragraph of the Statistics section, the text was added: However, the PBDE data were not available for 39 samples from 2011 and these samples were excluded from the statistical analyses involving ∑lipPOP

Equation 2 in statistics was corrected.

An erratum to this article is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11356-017-9330-9.

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Bjerregaard-Olesen, C., Long, M., Ghisari, M. et al. Temporal trends of lipophilic persistent organic pollutants in serum from Danish nulliparous pregnant women 2011–2013. Environ Sci Pollut Res 24, 16592–16603 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-017-8992-7

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