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Temporal variability of daily personal magnetic field exposure metrics in pregnant women

Journal of Exposure Science & Environmental Epidemiology volume 25, pages 58–64 (2015)Cite this article

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Abstract

Recent epidemiology studies of power-frequency magnetic fields and reproductive health have characterized exposures using data collected from personal exposure monitors over a single day, possibly resulting in exposure misclassification due to temporal variability in daily personal magnetic field exposure metrics, but relevant data in adults are limited. We assessed the temporal variability of daily central tendency (time-weighted average, median) and peak (upper percentiles, maximum) personal magnetic field exposure metrics over 7 consecutive days in 100 pregnant women. When exposure was modeled as a continuous variable, central tendency metrics had substantial reliability, whereas peak metrics had fair (maximum) to moderate (upper percentiles) reliability. The predictive ability of a single-day metric to accurately classify participants into exposure categories based on a weeklong metric depended on the selected exposure threshold, with sensitivity decreasing with increasing exposure threshold. Consistent with the continuous measures analysis, sensitivity was higher for central tendency metrics than for peak metrics. If there is interest in peak metrics, more than 1 day of measurement is needed over the window of disease susceptibility to minimize measurement error, but 1 day may be sufficient for central tendency metrics.

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Acknowledgements

Work was supported by contract CP P12618/C6280 from the Electric Power Research Institute and grant HD37584 from the National Institutes of Health. We thank Sarah Causey, Chyrise Bradley, and James Terry, Jr. for their work in the original analysis and the participating clinics for allowing us to recruit study participants in those settings.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Environmental Health Sciences, University of Michigan School of Public Health, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA

    Ryan C Lewis & John D Meeker

  2. Department of Epidemiology, University of North Carolina Gillings School of Global Public Health, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA

    Kelly R Evenson

  3. Department of Epidemiology, Brown University School of Public Health, Providence, Rhode Island, USA

    David A Savitz

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  1. Ryan C Lewis
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  2. Kelly R Evenson
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  3. David A Savitz
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  4. John D Meeker
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Correspondence to John D Meeker.

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Supplementary Information accompanies the paper on the Journal of Exposure Science and Environmental Epidemiology website

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Lewis, R., Evenson, K., Savitz, D. et al. Temporal variability of daily personal magnetic field exposure metrics in pregnant women. J Expo Sci Environ Epidemiol 25, 58–64 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/jes.2014.18

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