The association between gestational use of personal care products and neonatal urological abnormality at birth: The Japan Environment and Children’s Study

Abstract Congenital anomalies of the kidney and urinary tract (CAKUT) include a broad group of birth defects. Exposure to endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) is suspected to be one of the risk factors for CAKUT, and the use of personal care products (PCPs) is a source of EDC exposure. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the relationship between CAKUT and the use of PCPs in a large birth cohort study. Data from 86,899 pregnant women included in the Japan Environment and Children’s Study (JECS), an ongoing nationwide project, were analyzed. The prevalence of CAKUT in newborns was 0.25% and almost 90% of subjects used PCPs during mid-late pregnancy. No association was found between CAKUT and PCP use in a model adjusted for the following covariates: maternal age at delivery. The result was persistent after rigorous sensitivity analyses.