Abstract
Heavy metals are ubiquitous and nonbiodegradable pollutants that are widely distributed in the environment. Heavy metal exposure can damage various biological tissues and cause several diseases. This study aimed to investigate the association between blood and urinary cadmium, lead, and mercury levels and erectile dysfunction (ED) based on data from the 2001–2004 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. In total, 3681 participants were included in the analysis. Results showed that participants with ED had high blood cadmium, mercury, creatinine, urinary lead, cadmium levels, low blood lead, serum cotinine, and urinary mercury levels. Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that only blood cadmium level was an independent risk factor of ED (tertile [T]2 vs T1: odds ratio = 1.495, 95% confidence interval: 1.181–1.892, p = 0.001; T3 vs T1: odds ratio = 2.089, 95% confidence interval: 1.554–2.809, p < 0.001). The dose–response curve showed a positive nonlinear association between blood cadmium and lead levels and ED and a negative nonlinear association between blood and urinary mercury levels and ED after propensity score matching. In conclusion, heavy metal exposure is closely correlated with the development of ED, and a high blood cadmium level is an independent risk factor of ED.
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We thank Bullet Edits Limited for the linguistic editing of this manuscript.
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This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (no. 81871157).
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Chunhui Liu: conceptualization and writing–original draft preparation; Weipu Mao: formal analysis and writing–reviewing and editing; Zonghao You: conceptualization and data curation; Bin Xu: data Curation; Shuqiu Chen: visualization; Jianping Wu: writing–reviewing and editing; Chao Sun: project administration and funding acquisition; Ming Chen: writing–reviewing and editing and supervision. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Liu, C., Mao, W., You, Z. et al. Associations between exposure to different heavy metals and self-reported erectile dysfunction: a population-based study using data from the 2001-2004 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Environ Sci Pollut Res 29, 73946–73956 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-20910-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-20910-x