Effects of long-term low-level radiation exposure after the Chernobyl catastrophe on immunoglobulins in children residing in contaminated areas: prospective and cross-sectional studies

Environmental Health

Research

Daria M McMahon¹  Wilfried Karmaus²  Yevgenia I Stepanova³  Valentina Kondrashova³  Oksana M Litvinetz³  Vitaliy Y Vdovenko³  Erik Svendsen⁴ 

[1] Arnold School of Public Health, University of South Carolina, 800 Sumter Street, 29208, Columbia, SC, USA;Division of Epidemiology, Biostatistics, and Environmental Health Science, School of Public Health University of Memphis, 301 Robison Hall, 38152, Memphis, TN, USA;Research Center for Radiation Medicine, Academy of Medical Sciences of Ukraine, 53 Melnikova St, 04050, Kiev, Ukraine;Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, 1440 Canal Street, 70112, New Orleans, LA, USA;

关键词: Caesium;    Chernobyl;    Epidemiology;    Immunoglobulin;    Ionizing radiation;    Children;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1476-069X-13-36

 received in 2013-08-14, accepted in 2014-05-01,  发布年份 2014

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundAfter the Chernobyl nuclear incident in 1986, children in the Narodichesky region, located 80 km west of the Chernobyl Power Plant, were exposed to 137Cesium (137Cs). Little is known about the effects of chronic low-level radiation on humoral immune responses in children residing in contaminated areas.MethodsIn four different approaches we investigated the effect of residential 137Cs exposure on immunoglobulins A, G, M, and specific immunoglobulin E in children. In a dynamic cohort (1993–1998) we included 617 children providing 2,407 repeated measurements; 421 and 523 children in two cross-sectional samples (1997–1998 and 2008–2010, respectively); and 25 participants in a small longitudinal cohort (1997–2010). All medical exams, blood collections, and analyses were conducted by the same team. We used mixed linear models to analyze repeated measurements in cohorts and general linear regression models for cross-sectional studies.ResultsResidential soil contamination in 2008 was highly correlated with the individual body burden of 137Cs. Serum IgG and IgM concentrations increased between 1993 and 1998. Children with higher 137Cs soil exposure had lower serum IgG levels, which, however, increased in the small cohort assessed between 1997 and 2010. Children within the fourth quintile of 137Cs soil exposure (266–310 kBq/m2) had higher IgM serum concentrations between 1993 and 1998 but these declined between 1997 and 2010. IgA remained stable with median 137Cs exposures related to higher IgA levels, which was corroborated in the cross-sectional study of 2008–2010. Specific IgE against indoor allergens was detected less often in children with higher 137Cs exposure.ConclusionsOur findings show radiation-related alterations of immunoglobulins which by themselves do not constitute adverse health effects. Further investigations are necessary to understand how these changes affect health status.

【 授权许可】

Unknown   
© McMahon et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2014. This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited.