Nationwide Study - How Environment Affects Children's Health/Development

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Area's kids in major study

County children, mothers to be enlisted for nationwide look at

environmental effects on health.

By Dorsey Griffith - Bee Medical Writer

Published 12:00 am PDT Friday, October 5, 2007

Story appeared in MAIN NEWS section, Page A16

Sacramento County moms and their babies will participate in what is

being called the largest and longest nationwide study to examine how

the environment affects children's health and development, federal

health officials said Thursday.

The National Children's Study eventually will recruit 100,000 children

from 100 locations, including about 1,000 children from the Sacramento

area.

The goal is better understanding of underlying causes for an array of

conditions affecting children at startlingly high rates: obesity,

asthma, diabetes and autism, among others.

" There is mounting evidence that the health habits of early childhood

affect the well-being of adults, " said Dr. Duane , director

of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, which

is directing the study in collaboration with federal agencies such as

the Environmental Protection Agency and the Centers for Disease

Control and Prevention.

" Researchers will examine not only what children are eating and

drinking, but what's in the air they breathe, what's in the dust in

their homes, and their possible exposures to chemicals from materials

used to construct their homes and schools, " said.

Participants will be followed from before birth until they turn 21

years old, although findings from the research will trickle out

throughout the life of the study. The first results may be published

as early as 2011.

UC expects to receive nearly $32 million over seven years to

lead recruitment and data collection in Sacramento County.

researchers also will oversee the project in San Mateo County.

Recruitment is set to start in 2009.

After childbirth, researchers will collect a piece of placenta and a

sample of umbilical cord blood from participating mothers. As their

children mature, hair and nail clippings will be collected and blood

and urine samples drawn periodically. Specimens will be analyzed for

exposure to environmental contaminants.

At home, the environment will be studied, as will a child's media

consumption habits. Parental disciplinary tactics and other factors

that can affect childhood behavior and emotional well-being also will

be examined.

Dr. Scheid, national director of the $3.2 billion effort, said

specimens will be kept in a central repository, available to

government and private-sector researchers hoping to solve child health

and development quandaries. Participants' names will be kept strictly

confidential, he said.

" The samples, both environmental and biological, can then be analyzed

for those children who experience these (health) conditions in

comparison to children who do not experience those conditions, " said

Scheid. " That will inform us about the cause of and factors that

contribute to these conditions. "

Dr. Pan, a UC pediatrician and member of the study

research team, praised the ambitious approach.

" The problems we are seeing in pediatrics need to be better understood

to be treated effectively, " he said. " Data from the National

Children's Study will give us the knowledge to change health trends

that start during childhood and lead to poor health later in life. "

Irva Hertz-Picciotto, a professor in the UC Department of Public

Health Sciences, will lead the local project. Before recruitment can

occur, she said, her research team must provide demographic data to

the National Institutes of Health, which will then determine specific

communities to be targeted for the study.

Researchers want a representative sample of the U.S. population, a

study group that reflects its ethnic, racial, economic and geographic

diversity. Once individual neighborhoods are determined,

Hertz-Picciotto said, researchers will knock on doors looking for

women who are pregnant or plan to become pregnant in the near future.

Local doctors, family planning clinics and other family and parenting

agencies -- possibly even maternity shops -- also will be used to

assist recruitment.

Many efforts will be employed to garner support for the project, both

locally and nationally. U.S. Rep. Doris Matsui, D-Sacramento, this

week launched the Congressional Children's Study Working Group, whose

aim will be to bolster continued congressional support, and keep the

study's annual funding intact.

Scheid acknowledged that families' participation in the project will

require a big commitment, one that will last many years and demand

fairly regular clinical and home visits with researchers, and time

filling out lengthy questionnaires.

" This is not an insignificant burden, " he said, adding that

participants will have to be motivated by a desire to learn about

their child's health, and to contribute to a broader understanding of

environmental impacts on child health.

Nonetheless, he said, participants will be compensated " at an

appropriate level ... so it expresses appreciation but is not coercive. "

About the writer:

* The Bee's Dorsey Griffith can be reached at (916) 321-1089

or dgriffith@....