Parental e-Cigarette Use Linked to Atopic Dermatitis Risk in Children
TOPLINE:
METHODOLOGY:
- AD is one of the most common inflammatory conditions in children and is linked to environmental risk factors, such as exposure to secondhand smoke and prenatal exposure to tobacco.
- To address the effect of e-cigarettes use on children, researchers conducted a cross-sectional analysis of data from the 2014-2018 National Health Interview Survey, a nationally representative sample of the US population.
- The analysis included 48,637,111 individuals (mean age, 8.4 years), with 6,354,515 (13%) indicating a history of AD (mean age, 8 years).
TAKEAWAY:
- The prevalence of parental e-cigarette use was 18.0% among individuals with AD, compared with 14.4% among those without AD.
- This corresponded to a 24% higher risk for AD associated with parental e-cigarette use (adjusted odds ratio, 1.24; 95% CI, 1.08-1.42).
- The association between e-cigarette use and AD in children held regardless of parent’s sex.
IN PRACTICE:
“Our results suggest that parental e-cigarette use was associated with pediatric AD,” the authors concluded. They noted that the authors of a previous study that associated e-cigarette use with AD in adults postulated that the cause was “the inflammatory state created by” e-cigarettes.
SOURCE:
This study, led by Gun Min Youn, Department of Dermatology, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California, was published online in JAMA Dermatology.
LIMITATIONS:
The cross-sectional survey design limited the ability to draw causal inferences. Defining e-cigarette use as a single past instance could affect the strength of the findings. Only past-year e-cigarette use was considered. Furthermore, data on pediatric cigarette or e-cigarette use, a potential confounder, were unavailable.
DISCLOSURES:
The study did not disclose funding information. One author reported receiving consultation fees outside the submitted work. No other disclosures were reported.
A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.