TOP 77 - Gestational exposure to polybrominated diphenyl ether (PBDE) flame retardants and depressive symptoms in a longitudinal birth cohort

Publication Number: 2830.TOP 77

Aimee Vester, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States; Yingying Xu, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States; Melinda C. MacDougall, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States; Nicholas Newman, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States; Kim M. Cecil, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States; Kimberly Yolton, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States

Background: Depression impacts 20% of Americans during their lifetime. Environmental exposures, including polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs), are associated with increased risk of depression. PBDEs are a class of chemicals introduced in the 1970s. They were widely used as flame retardants in furniture, electronics, and childcare products to meet flammability standards. In the United States, nearly 100% of pregnant women had measurable levels of serum PBDEs from 2003-2004. A recent meta-analysis shows that PBDE exposure has not declined significantly since being phased out between 2004 and 2013 due to toxicity concerns. Analyses from the Health Outcomes and Measurements of the Environment (HOME) Study identified positive associations between gestational PBDE exposure and adolescent internalizing symptoms at age 12 years, and higher gestational PBDE exposure was associated with significantly higher maternal depressive symptoms up to 8 years after giving birth. Given the ubiquity of PBDE exposure and pervasiveness of depression in the United States, examining the longitudinal association between gestational PBDE exposure and depressive symptoms in young adulthood has important public health implications. We will describe the association between gestational PBDE exposure and depressive symptoms at ages 8-18 years.

Objective: Examine the association between gestational PBDE exposure and depressive symptoms measured via Children’s Depression Inventory (CDI-II) at ages 8 and 12 years and Beck Depression Inventory (BDI-II) at age 18 years.

Design/Methods: The HOME Study is a longitudinal pregnancy and birth cohort that enrolled 468 pregnant women from 2003 to 2006 from the Cincinnati area. Offspring were followed to age 18 years. Maternal serum samples were collected at 16 weeks gestation. Gas chromatography/isotope dilution high-resolution mass spectrometry quantified 5 PBDE congeners. Participants completed the CDI-II at the 8- and 12-year study visits, and the BDI-II at the 18-year study visit. There are 288 participants with gestational PBDE measurements and at least 1 CDI or BDI score available.

We finalized 18-year data collection and processing in September and developed a directed acyclic graph (DAG) to identify important covariates in October. By December, we will conduct descriptive analyses to examine study participant characteristics. By January 31, 2026, we will perform repeated measures analyses with the CDI and BDI T-scores as the outcome, using generalized estimating equations (GEE) and adjusting for covariates.