ORGANOCHLORINE EXPOSURE AND THE RISK OF ENDOMETRIOSIS

Objective: To compare mean concentrations of organochlorine in women w ith a new diagnosis of endometriosis and in controls. Design: Case-con trol study. Setting: Women attending an institutional clinic of reprod uctive endocrinology. Patient(s): Cases and controls were selected amo ng women who underwent laparoscopy for chronic pelvic pain, infertilit y, or tubal fulguration between January 1994 and December 1994. Eighty -six women with endometriosis and 70 controls, matched for the indicat ion for laparoscopy, were recruited. Main Outcome Measure(s): Mean org anochlorine plasma concentrations of 14 polychlorinated biphenyl conge ners and 11 chlorinated pesticides were compared between the cases and controls. Analysis of covariance was used to adjust means for confoun ding variables, and odds ratios were estimated by logistic regression. Result(s): Crude geometric mean concentrations did not differ signifi cantly between cases and controls for any of the organochlorine compou nds. Similarly, crude or adjusted means of the sum of polychlorinated biphenyl congeners, the sum of chlordanes, or the sum of dichlorodiphe nyltrichloroethanes did not differ between the groups. There was no si gnificant linear trend in the adjusted odds ratios for endometriosis a s organochlorine concentrations increased. Conclusion(s): These result s suggest that exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls and chlorinated p esticides during adulthood is not associated with endometriosis in the general population. (C) 1998 by American Society for Reproductive Med icine.