The association between urinary cotinine level and metabolic syndrome profiles among adolescents: findings from the Ewha Birth and growth study

Abstract

Background: Secondhand smoke (SHS) exposure among adolescents who are still developing can negatively affect their physical and psychological health, including metabolic syndrome (MetS), which is a risk factor for cardiovascular disease. However, the relationship between exposure to SHS and MetS in adolescence has not been evaluated. Methods: A total of 240 subjects aged 13–15 years who were followed up in the Ewha Birth and Growth Study were included in this study. Using the urinary cotinine level, the participants’ exposure to SHS was divided into tertiles, and the continuous MetS score (cMetS) and its components were compared among the three groups using a generalized linear model and trend analysis. Univariate and multivariate linear regression analyses were performed. We adjusted for several confounding variables including sex, father’s education level, father’s current alcohol consumption status, moderate physical activity, and overweight status. Results: The association between cMetS and the urinary cotinine level was not significant. However, the higher the urinary cotinine level, the lower the high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) level. In particular, the significance of the HDL-C level was maintained after adjusting for covariates. Conclusions: This study supports an association between SHS exposure and the components of MetS in adolescents aged 13–15 years, and it suggests the need to address SHS exposure in adolescents to reduce the cardiovascular risk in later life.

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“…The bottom-up approach takes into account the external exposure, through environmental factors, air, water, radiation, but also through diet or lifestyle to quantify the levels of summed contaminants and estimate individual exposures. More recently, the definition has been expanded to include combinations of external exposure to chemical, physical, psychological and social factors [14,54]. Although attractive to some researchers, this bottom-up approach required a huge effort to assess the multitude of largely unknown analytes in various external environments.…”

Active smoking in urban households: An association between urinary cotinine metabolite level and serum eGFR concentration

“…Although most other research used questionnaires for determining smoking exposure 36 , our study used direct smoking exposure detection. In addition, our study found that both genders had the same urinary cotinine metabolite concentration, in contrast to a previous study that found higher concentrations in males than in females 37 .…”