The use of pesticides in a Polish rural population and its effect on birth weight.
BACKGROUND
The risk of adverse reproductive outcomes related to pesticide exposure has been investigated in few studies; however, the results have not been consistent. The goal of the present study was to evaluate the influence of maternal residual exposure to pesticides on birth weight among women in an agricultural district in Central Poland.


METHODS
Subjects included 104 women who delivered a single, live infant between 1 January 1994 and 31 December 2000. Based on maternal reports, the type of farming (crops, orchards, non-farming jobs), involvement in field work and the trade names of pesticides used within last pregnancy were established. Birth weight for the most recent pregnancy was abstracted from the medical data of the local maternity unit.


RESULTS
Mothers who reported involvement in field work had a similar pregnancy duration but delivered infants with a significantly higher birth weight than mothers not reporting such activities in the first or second trimester of pregnancy (P=0.04). However, after controlling for pregnancy duration and other factors affecting birth weight, we found that maternal exposure to synthetic pyrethroids in the first or second trimester was associated with a small but statistically significant decrease in birth weight (P=0.02).


CONCLUSIONS
We postulate that the observed effect of pyrethroids exposure was related to a slower pace of foetal development corresponding to the small-for-gestational-age (SGA) birth.
Hanke
Wojciech
W
Department of Environmental Epidemiology, Nofer Institute of Occupational Medicine, 8 Teresy St., 90-950 Lodz, Poland. wojt@imp.lodz.pl
Romitti
Paul
P
Fuortes
Laurence
L
Sobala
Wojciech
W
Mikulski
Marek
M
D000328:Adult; D000383:Agriculture; D001724:Birth Weight; D016021:Epidemiologic Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D018811:Maternal Exposure; D016273:Occupational Exposure; D010575:Pesticides / Q000506:poisoning*; D011044:Poland; D011247:Pregnancy; D012424:Rural Population
D010575:Pesticides