Environmental tobacco smoke exposure in low-income 6-year-olds: Parent report and urine cotinine measures

• Published in: Nicotine & tobacco research 2003-06, Vol.5 (3), p.333-339
• Main Authors: Cornelius, Marie D., Goldschmidt, Lidush, Dempsey, Delia A.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adult; Biological and medical sciences; Child; Cotinine - urine; Environmental Exposure; Female; Humans; Indicators and Reagents - analysis; Male; Medical sciences; Mother-Child Relations; Poverty; Reproducibility of Results; Smoking; Tobacco Smoke Pollution - adverse effects; Tobacco, tobacco smoking; Toxicology; Truth Disclosure
• ISSN: 1462-2203; 1469-994X
• DOI: 10.1080/1462220031000094141

We examined the prevalence and level of environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) exposure using urine cotinine levels in children and three types of maternal self-reports in a sample of 196 low socioeconomic status (SES) mothers and their children. The self-reports were report of the mother's own smoking, report of the number of household smokers, and report of the usual number of daily hours that the child was exposed to ETS. According to the reports, 59% of the children's mothers were current smokers, 71% of the children came from households with smokers, and 85% had daily exposure to ETS. Based on urine cotinine measures adjusted for creatinine, 79% of the children were identified as ETS exposed. The average urine cotinine level was 19.6 ng/mg, and the median cotinine level was 13.1 ng/mg (range: 0–120 ng/mg). Correlations between urine cotinine levels and the three maternal reports were 0.48, 0.43, and 0.36, respectively. The most sensitive maternal report measure was number of hours of exposure per day when using adjusted urine cotinine levels of ≥5 ng/mg were used as the yardstick of exposure. Of the 154 children screened at the level of ≥5 ng/mg, 89.5% were also identified by maternal report as ETS exposed. However, 30 children whose mothers reported ETS exposure had urine cotinine levels of