Household Pesticides and the Risk of Wilms Tumor

Abstract

BackgroundPrevious epidemiologic studies have suggested that exposure to pesticides in utero and during early childhood may increase the risk for development of childhood cancer, including Wilms tumor, a childhood kidney tumor.ObjectivesIn this analysis we evaluated the role of residential pesticide exposure in relation to the risk of Wilms tumor in children using data from a North American case–control study.MethodsThe National Wilms Tumor Study Group (NWTSG) collected information on exposure to residential pesticides from the month before pregnancy through the diagnosis reference date using detailed phone interviews from 523 case mothers and 517 controls frequency matched on child’s age and geographic region and identified by list-assisted random digit dialing. Pesticides were grouped according to type of pesticide and where they were used.ResultsA slightly increased risk of Wilms tumor was found among children of mothers who reported insecticide use [odds ratio (OR) = 1.4, 95% confidence interval (CI), 1.0–1.8; adjusted for education, income, and the matching variables]. Results from all other categories of pesticides were generally close to the null.ConclusionsThis study is the largest case–control study of Wilms tumor to date. We were unable to confirm earlier reports of an increased risk for Wilms tumor among those exposed to residential pesticides during pregnancy through early childhood.

Residential Exposure to Pesticide During Childhood and Childhood Cancers: A Meta-Analysis

“…42 f Where .1 home pesticide usage was reported, home pesticides for nuisance pests were used. g In the study 30 where the results were essentially the same during pregnancy and during childhood, the data reported from pregnancy through childhood were treated as during childhood. h Includes studies 35,39,41 and ORs associated with yard pesticides were replaced by yard insecticides in studies.…”

“…41 j Includes 2 studies. 32,40 k In addition to all yard insecticides in each subgroup, an additional study 30 was included and ORs associated with yard pesticides were replaced by yard insecticides.…”

“…No association appeared between herbicide exposure and CBT. When studies on all types of childhood cancers were combined, including neuroblastoma 31 and Wilms tumor, 30 a statistically significant association with residential herbicide exposure was observed (OR = 1.35; 95% CI, 1.16-1.55; I 2 = 23%). We did not find any statistically significant association between exposure to outdoor pesticides or outdoor insecticides and any types of childhood cancers (Fig 4).…”

“…A total of 16 articles met the full inclusion criteria and were eventually included in the metaanalysis. [28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43] The characteristics of the studies used in the meta-analysis are shown in Table 1. All 16 studies are casecontrolled studies published between 1993 and 2012.…”

Maternal smoking during pregnancy and childhood cancer in New South Wales: a record linkage investigation

“…A limitation of the dataset available was that other environmental hazards of mothers, which have been reported to increase the risk of childhood cancer such as alcohol and beverage intake, occupational hazards, medical history, diet and drug (licit and illicit) use could not be accounted for [49,[59][60][61][62][63][64][65][66][67]. Paternal smoking status and postnatal environmental or chemical hazard exposure experienced, which may also be associated with some childhood tumors, also could not be measured [16,49,57,17,68].…”