Congenital abnormalities and indicators of germinal mutations in the vicinity of an acrylonitrile producing factory

The results of an environmental mutation and teratologic epidemiological st udy are presented which was performed in inhabitants living in the surround ing region of an acrylonitrile factory in Nyergesujfalu. The endpoint of th e study was congenital abnormalities in 46,326 infants born to mothers livi ng in the 30 settlements of the study region within a 25 km radius of the a crylonitrile factory between 1980 and 1996. The ascertainment of cases with congenital abnormalities was based on the dataset of the Hungarian Congeni tal Abnormality Registry complemented with the review of pediatric, patholo gy and cytogenetic records. A particular attention was paid to the indicato rs of germinal mutations as sentinel anomalies, Down syndrome and unidentif ied multiple congenital abnormalities and the indicators of teratogens as t he specific pattern of multiple congenital abnormalities. Three congenital abnormalities: pectus excavatum in Tate, 1990-1992 (OR with 95%CI: 78.5, 8. 4-729.6), undescended testis in Nyergesujfalu between 1980 and 1983 (8.6, 1 .4-54.3) and in Esztergom, 1981-1982 (4.2, 1.3-13.5) and clubfoot in Tata, 1980-1981 (5.5, 1.5-20.3) showed significant time-space clusters in the stu dy region. There was a decrease in risk of undescended testis with increasi ng distance from the acrylonitrile factory. An unusual increase was found i n the combination of oral cleft and cardiac septal defects in multimalforme d babies in Tatabanya, 1990. The detailed analysis of congenital abnormalit ies in all settlements of a given territory may help to detect clusters of congenital abnormalities and their possible relation to the environmental h azards. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.