Purpose: Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a class of man-made chemicals used in many products. Recent in vitro and epidemiological reports have found that PFAS exposure can modify the function of platelets. Platelet size has been shown to affect platelet activity, and thrombograms are a simple method of indirect assessment of platelet function. However, there has been no large-scale research investigating the association between PFAS levels and complete thrombograms in humans.
Approach and results: In the current cross-sectional study, we enrolled 1779 Taiwanese subjects (aged between 12 and 63 years) to study the associations between serum PFAS concentrations and thrombograms. There were 1175 men and 604 women with a mean age of 34.5 years. When all four PFAS were fitted by the multiple linear models at the same time, platelet counts decreased significantly with increasing quartiles of perfluorooctanoate acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS), while platelet distribution width (PDW), mean platelet volume (MPV), and platelet-large cell ratio (PLCR) also increased significantly with increasing quartiles of PFOS. The mean platelet count was the lowest (264.02 k/µL [95% CI 256.00-272.04]; P < 0.001) when both PFOA and PFOS concentrations were above the 50th percentile.
Conclusions: We report that serum PFAS levels were correlated with thrombograms. If the association is etiologic, PFOA/PFOS may decrease the number of platelets, while PFOS may also increase the variation and the average size of platelets in the subjects of the study. Interestingly, PFOA and PFOS may have synergistic effects on the decrease in platelet counts. Further research is needed to study the effect of PFAS on platelets in humans.
Keywords: PFAS: Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances; PFOA: Perfluorooctanoate acid; PFOS: Perfluorooctane sulfonate; Platelet; Thrombogram.
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