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Environmental Pollutants Linked With Increased ALS Risk, Mortality
An environmental risk score that assessed exposure to pesticides, carcinogenic polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and other toxic pollutants via a plasma sample was associated with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) risk and mortality in a Michigan cohort, according to a study published in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry.
“For the first time, we have a means collecting a tube of blood and looking at a person’s risk for ALS based on being exposed to scores of toxins in the environment,” said first author Stephen Goutman, MD, MS, director of the Pranger ALS Clinic and associate director of the ALS Center of Excellence at University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan.
The association between environmental toxin exposure and ALS was first discovered in 2016, when researchers identified elevated levels of numerous pesticides in blood taken from patients with ALS. Later, they found that elevated levels of PCBs and other pollutants in the blood of patients were associated with ALS progression and poor survival.
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To replicate the findings, researchers analyzed blood samples from 164 patients with ALS and 105 control participants without ALS, all of whom were from Michigan. Researchers investigated risk and survival with 36 individual persistent organic pollutants (POPs) as well as for a mix of POPs, represented by environmental risk scores.
According to the study, 8 PCBs and 7 organochlorine pesticides were individually associated with ALS risk in the study cohort. However, a mix of pesticides was most strongly associated with increased ALS risk.
Individuals in the highest quartile of mixed exposure had more than double the risk of ALS compared with those in the lowest quartile, the study found. Mixed exposure was further associated with survival after diagnosis.
“These data continue to support POPs as important factors for ALS risk and progression and replicate findings in a new cohort,” wrote corresponding author Eva L. Feldman, MD, PhD, of the University of Michigan Department of Neurology, and coauthors. “The assessments of POPs in non-Michigan ALS cohorts are encouraged to better understand the global effect and the need for targeted disease risk reduction strategies.”
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