20971
Prospective Vs. Retrospective Report of Indoor Pesticide Use during the Perinatal Period
Objectives: Compare the reliability of maternal report of product use in and around her home on the ELEAT (Early Life Exposure Assessment Tool) administered retrospectively with her responses regarding the same products reported prospectively during pregnancy.
Methods: Participants (n=130) from the MARBLES (Markers of Autism Risk in Babies-Learning Early Signs)prospective study underwent structured interviews during pregnancy and then again with the ELEAT, a shorter instrument derived from the one utilized longitudinally, 2 or more years postpartum. The ELEAT environment module has questions about interior paint, pet flea and tick treatments, personal care products, and indoor/outdoor pesticide use. Agreement was assessed with Cohen’s Kappa statistic (K), sensitivity, specificity and Youden’s index (YI=Sensitivity+Specificity – 1).
Results: We found excellent agreement (K= 0.61, YI=0.59) for mothers reporting professional outdoor pesticide use during the index time (3 months before pregnancy through the child’s 1st year). Questions about freshly painted walls, pet flea and tick pouch products, antibacterial soap, and indoor pesticide foggers had moderate agreement (K=0.41-0.60,YI=0.42-0.63). Other pesticide questions, professional indoor applications and, indoor and outdoor sprays, had fair agreement (K=0.21-0.40, YI=0.19-0.38). Report of pet flea treatments; such as, soap, collars, and skin products showed fair agreement. Differences in wording of the questions may have contributed to these findings of only fair agreement. Responses to specific time points over the index period did not perform as well and generally had fair agreement.
Conclusions: In this study population, responses on environmental questions at 2 years postpartum or later had very good to fair agreement when compared to answers given prospectively during the perinatal period. Studies relying on retrospective reporting need to take misclassification into account.