Prenatal exposure of rare earth elements cerium and ytterbium and neonatal thyroid stimulating hormone levels: Findings from a birth cohort study

Abstract Background Prior studies have suggested exposure to heavy metals and endocrine disrupting chemicals could disturb the homeostasis of thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH), but no epidemiology study concerning the influence of rare earth elements (REE) exposure during pregnancy on neonatal TSH levels. The present study aimed to investigate the relationships between prenatal REE exposure and neonatal TSH levels. Methods A total of 7367 pregnant women were recruited from Wuhan Children’s Hospital between September 2012 and October 2014 in Wuhan, China. Urinary concentrations of cerium (Ce), and ytterbium (Yb) were measured by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). Immunofluorescence assay was used to detect neonatal TSH levels. The associations between REE exposure and neonatal TSH levels were evaluated using multivariate linear regression models. Results The geometric means of maternal urinary Ce and Yb concentrations were 0.060 μg/g creatinine and 0.025 μg/g creatinine, respectively. The results showed that per doubling of maternal urinary Ce and Yb were associated with 4.07% (95% CI: −5.80%, −2.31%), 5.13% (95% CI: −6.93%, −3.30%) decreased neonatal TSH levels respectively in the adjusted model. Sex stratified analysis demonstrated that the decreased neonatal TSH levels were observed both in male infants and female infants, and the decrease was greater in male infants in urinary Ce. There were no significant interactions between maternal urinary Ce, Yb and infant sex (Ce: P for interaction = 0.173, Yb: P for interaction = 0.967). Conclusions Our findings demonstrated that increased maternal urinary Ce and Yb were associated with decreased neonatal TSH levels. Further researches from different populations are warranted to verify the association and to explore the mechanisms.