Parental occupational exposures and the risk of cerebral palsy in children

Introduction: Association of parental occupational exposure to chemicals with cerebral palsy (CP) in children remains poorly characterized. 

Objectives: To ascertain the role of parents’ occupational exposure in CP in children in major Kazakhstan cities using a case-control design.

Method: We enrolled 150 cases, including children one month to 18 years old, and 150 controls in all regions of Kazakhstan. Cases were children with confirmed diagnoses on treatment or rehabilitation, whereas controls were their counterparts with no CP. Exposure to hazardous chemicals of parents at work and other demographics were collected with structured questionnaires, and logistic regression models, crude and adjusted,   were used to calculate the odds of CP in children, expressed as odds ratios (OR) with their 95% confidence intervals (CI).

Results: Most cases (52%) were children below one year of age. Prevalence of parents’ alcohol use did not differ between the groups, whereas we found more smokers in parents of controls compared to cases. There were more fathers in cases with exposure to chemicals (21% vs. 5% in controls, p<0.001). Father’s occupational chemical exposure increased the odds of CP in children (OR 18.7 (95% CI 3.3; 105.7), adjusted for age, sex, father’s highest attained education and mother’s education; and OR 36.8 (95% CI 3.6; 370.5) if further adjusted for father’s and mother’s smoking).

Conclusions: Greater odds of CP in parents exposed to chemicals at work necessitate intense educational programmes for those planning to have children in the near future.

Sri Lanka Journal of Child Health, 2020; 49(2): 156-161