Parental occupational exposures prior to conception and offspring wheeze and eczema during first year of life

Abstract

Purpose: Parental exposures prior to conception might influence asthma and allergy risk in offspring. As occupational exposures are established risk factors for asthma and allergies, we investigated if parental occupational exposures prior to conception cause wheeze and eczema in offspring during the first year of life.

Methods: We analysed data of 436 families from an offspring cohort based on a follow-up study of German participants of the International Study of Asthma and Allergies in Childhood (ISAAC). Offspring cohort data was collected between 2009 and 2019. Occupational exposures were based on participants' work histories and measured by a Job-Exposure-Matrix. We used Bayesian logistic regression models for analysis. Inference and confounder selection were based on directed acyclic graphs.

Results: In mothers, for both allergic and irritative occupational exposures prior to conception suggestive effects on offspring eczema during the first year of life were found (allergens: odds ratio (OR) 1.22, 95% compatibility interval (CI) 0.92-1.57; irritants: OR 1.36, 95% CI 0.99-1.77), while no relation with wheeze was suggested.

Conclusions: Our results suggest that reduction of asthma-related occupational exposures might not only reduce the burden of disease for occupationally induced or aggravated asthma and allergies in employees but also in their children.

Keywords: Asthma; Dermatitis, atopic; Maternal exposure; Occupational exposure; Paternal exposure.