Research Article Developmental Effects of Exposures to Environmental Factors: The Polish Mother and Child Cohort Study

Copyright © 2013 Kinga Polanska et al.This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. This paper estimates the effects of exposure to environmental factors, including lead,mercury, environmental tobacco smoke (ETS), and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH), on child psychomotor development. The study population consists of mother-child pairs in the PolishMother and Child Cohort Study. Prenatal and postnatal exposure to environmental factors was determined from biomarkermeasurements as follows: for lead exposure—cord blood lead level, formercury—maternal hairmercury level, for ETS— cotinine level in saliva and urine, and for PAH—1-hydroxypyrene (1-HP) in urine. At the age of 12 (406 subjects) and 24 months (198 subjects) children were assessed using Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development.There were no statistically significant effects of prenatal exposure to mercury or 1-HP on child psychomotor development. After adjusting for potential confounders, adverse effects of prenatal exposure to ETS onmotor development