Association between gestational phthalate exposure and newborn head circumference; impacts by race and sex

Observational and experimental studies report associations between gestational phthalate exposure and fetal development, yet few data exist to characterize phthalate effects on head circumference (HC) or to estimate the impact of race or sex. To address this data gap, we enrolled 152 African American and 158 white mothers with uncomplicated singleton pregnancies from the Charleston, South Carolina (USA) metropolitan area in a prospective birth cohort. Study participants provided up to two urine specimens during mid and late gestation, completed a study questionnaire, and allowed access to hospital birth records. We measured eight phthalate monoester metabolites using liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometry, and calculated molar sums of phthalate parent diesters. After specific gravity correction, we tested for associations between phthalates and neonatal HC (cm) and cephalization index (cm/g) using multiple informant linear regression with inverse probability weighting to account for selection bias between repeated urine sampling, adjusted for maternal race, age, body mass index, education, and smoking. We explored interactions by maternal race and infant sex. A doubling of urinary monoethyl phthalate (MEP) concentration was associated with a -0.49% (95%CI: -0.95%, -0.02%) smaller head circumference, although seven other phthalate metabolites were null. There were no statistically significant associations with cephalization index. HC was larger for whites than African American newborns (p < 0.0001) but similar for males and females (p = 0.16). We detected interactions for maternal race with urinary monobutyl phthalate (MBP; p = 0.03), monobenzyl phthalate (MBzP; p = 0.01), monoethylhexyl phthalate (MEHP; p = 0.05), monomethyl phthalate (MMP; p = 0.02), and the sum of dibutyl phthalate metabolites (∑DBP; p = 0.05), in which reduced HC circumference associations were stronger among whites than African Americans, and interactions for sex with MBP (p = 0.08) and MiBP (p = 0.03), in which associations were stronger for females than males. Our results suggest that gestational phthalate exposure is associated with smaller neonatal HC and that white mothers and female newborns have greater susceptibility.