Research | Mini-Monograph Prenatal Methylmercury Exposure and Developmental Outcomes: Review of the Evidence and Discussion of Future Directions

I conducted a review of the published literature to assess the strength of the evidence for an association between prenatal exposure to methylmercury (MeHg) and subsequent child development. I identified 12 studies on this subject published since 1980. Of these, 3 were longitudinal studies— 2 conduc...

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Main Author: Anne Spurgeon
Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
Format: Text
Language:English
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Online Access:http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.277.644
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spelling ftciteseerx:oai:CiteSeerX.psu:10.1.1.277.644 2023-05-15T16:10:43+02:00 Research | Mini-Monograph Prenatal Methylmercury Exposure and Developmental Outcomes: Review of the Evidence and Discussion of Future Directions Anne Spurgeon The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives application/zip http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.277.644 en eng http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.277.644 Metadata may be used without restrictions as long as the oai identifier remains attached to it. ftp://ftp.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pub/pmc/43/83/Environ_Health_Perspect_2006_Feb_18_114(2)_307-312.tar.gz text ftciteseerx 2016-01-07T20:53:58Z I conducted a review of the published literature to assess the strength of the evidence for an association between prenatal exposure to methylmercury (MeHg) and subsequent child development. I identified 12 studies on this subject published since 1980. Of these, 3 were longitudinal studies— 2 conducted in the Seychelle Islands, and 1 in the Faroe Islands. Nine were cross-sectional studies conducted in different countries where seafood, a source of MeHg, constituted a major part of the diet. The ages of the children studied ranged from 2 weeks to 12 years. The results of the longitudinal studies were contradictory. Researchers in the Faroe Islands identified an association between MeHg exposure and developmental effects, whereas those in the Seychelle Islands identified no such association. This inconsistency was mirrored in the results of the cross-sectional studies where there were some positive and some negative findings. It was concluded that it was not possible from currently available data to determine whether there is an association between prenatal MeHg exposure and adverse developmental effects in children. In advance of future research, consideration should be given to resolving the uncertainties surrounding exposure assessment and outcome measurement, as both elements varied between studies. It was suggested that questions of exposure assessment would benefit from the application of an expert review process. Outcome assessment would benefit from the development of theoretically based measures of specific aspects of cognitive functioning to replace the relatively crude measures of attainment and IQ currently employed in most studies. This would assist in the development of classic longitudinal studies by allowing repeated assessment over the full age range and providing data that are more readily interpretable and comparable between studies. Key words: developmental outcomes, methylmercury, neurobehavioral tests, prenatal exposure. Environ Health Perspect 114:307–312 (2006). doi:10.1289/ehp.7859 ... Text Faroe Islands Unknown Faroe Islands
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description I conducted a review of the published literature to assess the strength of the evidence for an association between prenatal exposure to methylmercury (MeHg) and subsequent child development. I identified 12 studies on this subject published since 1980. Of these, 3 were longitudinal studies— 2 conducted in the Seychelle Islands, and 1 in the Faroe Islands. Nine were cross-sectional studies conducted in different countries where seafood, a source of MeHg, constituted a major part of the diet. The ages of the children studied ranged from 2 weeks to 12 years. The results of the longitudinal studies were contradictory. Researchers in the Faroe Islands identified an association between MeHg exposure and developmental effects, whereas those in the Seychelle Islands identified no such association. This inconsistency was mirrored in the results of the cross-sectional studies where there were some positive and some negative findings. It was concluded that it was not possible from currently available data to determine whether there is an association between prenatal MeHg exposure and adverse developmental effects in children. In advance of future research, consideration should be given to resolving the uncertainties surrounding exposure assessment and outcome measurement, as both elements varied between studies. It was suggested that questions of exposure assessment would benefit from the application of an expert review process. Outcome assessment would benefit from the development of theoretically based measures of specific aspects of cognitive functioning to replace the relatively crude measures of attainment and IQ currently employed in most studies. This would assist in the development of classic longitudinal studies by allowing repeated assessment over the full age range and providing data that are more readily interpretable and comparable between studies. Key words: developmental outcomes, methylmercury, neurobehavioral tests, prenatal exposure. Environ Health Perspect 114:307–312 (2006). doi:10.1289/ehp.7859 ...
author2 The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
format Text
author Anne Spurgeon
spellingShingle Anne Spurgeon
Research | Mini-Monograph Prenatal Methylmercury Exposure and Developmental Outcomes: Review of the Evidence and Discussion of Future Directions
author_facet Anne Spurgeon
author_sort Anne Spurgeon
title Research | Mini-Monograph Prenatal Methylmercury Exposure and Developmental Outcomes: Review of the Evidence and Discussion of Future Directions
title_short Research | Mini-Monograph Prenatal Methylmercury Exposure and Developmental Outcomes: Review of the Evidence and Discussion of Future Directions
title_full Research | Mini-Monograph Prenatal Methylmercury Exposure and Developmental Outcomes: Review of the Evidence and Discussion of Future Directions
title_fullStr Research | Mini-Monograph Prenatal Methylmercury Exposure and Developmental Outcomes: Review of the Evidence and Discussion of Future Directions
title_full_unstemmed Research | Mini-Monograph Prenatal Methylmercury Exposure and Developmental Outcomes: Review of the Evidence and Discussion of Future Directions
title_sort research | mini-monograph prenatal methylmercury exposure and developmental outcomes: review of the evidence and discussion of future directions
url http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.277.644
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