Maternal exposure to arsenic and cadmium and the risk of congenital heart defects in offspring.

Abstract Hair arsenic and cadmium from 339 women with congenital heart defect (CHD)-affected pregnancies (case women) and 333 women with normal live births (control women) in China were estimated using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry. The median levels of hair arsenic and cadmium in the case women were 98.30 (74.30–136.30) ng/g and 14.60 (8.30–32.50) ng/g, respectively, which were significantly higher than the levels in the control group ( P