Cumulative risk assessment of phthalates exposure among infants and their mothers in Shanghai

OBJECTIVE: To estimate the levels of phthalates exposure and cumulative risk assessment among infants and their mothers in Shanghai by phthalate monoesters inurine specimens. METHODS: To collect urine specimens and questionnaires from 152 pairs of infants and mothers in Shanghai and conduct a cross-sectional study. Ten phthalate monoesters were determined by ultra performance liquid chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectroscopy. To estimate the internal exposure of 6 phthalates by creatininemodel and performe cumulative risk assessment by hazard index( HI). RESULTS: The top five of the concentration level of phthalate monoesters in mothers' urine specimens were mono-isobutyl phthalate( Mi BP), mono-n-butyl phthalate( Mn BP), mono-ethyl phthalate( MEP), mono-methyl phthalate( MMP) and mono-2-ethylhexyl phthalate( MEHP), while in infants ', they were Mi BP, Mn BP, MEP, MEHP and mono-2-ethyl-5-carboxypentyl phthalate( MECPP). The estimated daily intake( EDI) was calculated according to the concentration of urinary phthalates monoesters. And the DEHP was at the highest level both in mothers and infants, the geometric means( GMs) reached to 6. 64 and 14. 02 μg/(kg·d). While others from high to low were Di BP, Dn BP, DEP, DMP and BBP respectively. HI was used to perform cumulative risk assessment. The proportion of HI over 1 among mothers was 5. 92%, and among infants was 32. 24%. CONCLUSION: There are some health risks of the phthalates exposure among mothers and infants in communities in Shanghai, and the cumulative risks of infants are higher than mothers.