Abstract
Objective
Household chemicals may act as irritants in the lungs; however, their association with recurrent wheeze and asthma in children remains controversial. We aimed to investigate if household cleaning product exposure in infancy is associated with recurrent wheezing and asthma development in children.
Methods
We analyzed data from two cohorts: MARC-35 consisting of 815 children with history of severe bronchiolitis in infancy, and MARC-43 consisting of 525 healthy children in infancy. Frequency of use of cleaning product at the child’s home during infancy was collected via telephone interview with parents. Outcomes were recurrent wheezing by age 3 years and asthma diagnosis at age 6 years.
Results
In MARC-35, there was no association between cleaning product exposure in infancy and recurrent wheeze (adjusted HR = 1.01 [95% CI 0.66–1.54] for 4–7 days/week exposure frequency), nor asthma (adjusted OR = 0.91 [95% CI 0.51–1.63]). In MARC-43, there was also no association between cleaning product exposure in infancy and recurrent wheeze (adjusted HR = 0.69 [95% CI 0.29–1.67] for 4–7 days/week exposure frequency).
Conclusion
We found no association between household cleaning product exposure in infancy and later development of recurrent wheeze or asthma, even among children who are at high risk for asthma due to history of severe bronchiolitis.
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Data availability
The datasets analyzed during the current study are not publicly available due to privacy or ethical restrictions but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
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Funding
This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health (Bethesda, MD, USA) [grant numbers T32 AI007306, UH3 OD-023253]. The content of this manuscript is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.
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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by OD. The first draft of the manuscript was written by IFB and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Baroni, I.F., Mehta, G.D., Sullivan, A.F. et al. Association between household cleaning product exposure in infancy and development of recurrent wheeze and asthma. Int Arch Occup Environ Health 96, 1325–1332 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00420-023-02011-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00420-023-02011-5