Table 2.
Correlations among exposure measures
| Second trimester |
Late pregnancy/Delivery |
||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fish intake (serv/wk) |
Erythrocyte mercury (ng/g) |
Erythrocyte selenium (ng/ml) |
Selenium: mercury molar ratioa |
DHA+EPA intake (mg/day) |
Plasma DHA+EPA (mcg/ml) |
Fish intake (serv/wk) |
DHA+EPA intake (mg/day) |
Cord plasma DHA+EPA (mcg/ml) |
|
| N | 1068 | 872 | 872 | 872 | 1068 | 872 | 1068 | 1068 | 538 |
| Mean (SD) | 1.7 (1.5) | 4.0 (3.6) | 206 (35) | 0.3 (1.0) | 161 (166) | 98.4 (42) | 1.8 (1.5) | 117 (145) | 35.9 (22.0) |
| Min, max | 0.0, 12.0 | 0, 38.2 | 44.3, 380.3 | 0, 74.3 | 0, 2718 | 16.8, 237.1 | 0, 14.4 | 0, 1719 | 3.2, 167.1 |
| Pregnancy | Pearson r | ||||||||
| Second trimester | |||||||||
| Fish intake | 1.00 | 0.37 | 0.08 | −0.14 | 0.68 | 0.26 | 0.40 | 0.29 | 0.10 |
| Erythrocyte mercury |
0.37 | 1.00 | 0.15 | −0.20 | 0.33 | 0.23 | 0.26 | 0.26 | 0.13 |
| Erythrocyte selenium |
0.08 | 0.15 | 1.00 | 0.03 | 0.11 | 0.07 | 0.07 | 0.08 | 0.02 |
| Selenium:mercury molar ratio |
−0.14 | −0.20 | 0.03 | 1.00 | −0.11 | −0.08 | −0.07 | −0.05 | −0.01 |
| DHA+EPA intake | 0.68 | 0.33 | 0.11 | −0.11 | 1.00 | 0.26 | 0.23 | 0.25 | 0.09 |
| Plasma DHA+EPA | 0.26 | 0.23 | 0.07 | −0.08 | 0.26 | 1.00 | 0.13 | 0.12 | 0.14 |
| Delivery | |||||||||
| Fish intake | 0.40 | 0.26 | 0.07 | −0.07 | 0.23 | 0.13 | 1.00 | 0.77 | 0.06 |
| DHA+EPA intake | 0.29 | 0.26 | 0.08 | −0.05 | 0.25 | 0.12 | 0.77 | 1.00 | 0.01 |
| Cord DHA+EPA | 0.10 | 0.13 | 0.02 | −0.01 | 0.09 | 0.14 | 0.06 | 0.01 | 1.00 |
a
Selenium:mercury molar ratio = [Selenium (ng/ml)/79] / [mercury (ng/g)*5]
DHA - docosahexaenoic acid; EPA - eicosapentaenoic acid; BMI – body mass index