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The pregnancy research on inflammation, nutrition, & city environment: systematic analyses study (PRINCESA) cohort, 2009–2015

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Abstract

The Pregnancy Research on Inflammation, Nutrition, & City Environment: Systematic Analyses Study (PRINCESA) cohort was set up to evaluate associations between air pollution and birth outcomes among pregnant persons in Mexico City. Specifically, the study was designed to improve air pollution exposure assessment and elucidate biological mechanisms underlying associations between maternal exposures and adverse pregnancy outcomes. Pregnant persons (all women) (N = 935) between ages 18–45 who lived and/or worked in metropolitan Mexico City, Mexico, from 2009 to 2015 and liveborn singleton infants (N = 815) of participants who completed follow-up were enrolled in the cohort. We followed participants monthly from enrollment to delivery and the following categories of data were obtained: demographic, medical and obstetric history, geo-referenced data, repeated measures on daily activity patterns, reported food intake, anthropometric, clinical and obstetric data, 20 serum and 20 cervicovaginal cytokines, and lower reproductive tract infection. Repeated ultrasound measures of fetal parameters and infant birth data are also included in the study’s database. In addition, PRINCESA investigators calculated air pollution exposure measures for six pollutants measured by the Mexico City Atmospheric Monitoring System (SIMAT). These estimates utilize participants’ addresses to account for spatial variation in exposure (nearest monitor, inverse distance weighting, and kriging) and are available daily during pregnancy for participants. To date, associations between environmental and nutritional impacts on maternal and child health outcomes have been evaluated. PRINCESA has a comprehensive database of maternal and infant data and biological samples and offers collaboration opportunities to study associations between environmental and other factors, including nutrition and pregnancy outcomes.

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Data Availability

The PRINCESA investigators invite interested researchers to email Dr. Marie O’Neill, at marieo@umich.edu and Dr. Felipe Vadillo-Ortega at fvadillo@inmegen.gob.mx for information regarding collaboration.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the U.S. National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences [grant numbers R01 ES016932, R01 ES017022, and P30ES017885], the U.S. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) T42 OH008455, the Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnologia de Mexico (CONACyT grant A1S-35245; National Council on Science and Technology of Mexico), the Elizabeth Crosby Award from the University of Michigan, and the University of Michigan School of Public Health. The authors thank Ricardo de Majo, Divya Gumudavelly, the O’Neill Research Group at the University of Michigan School of Public Health, and the PRINCESA Cohort Mexico City Research Group for collecting and processing the data.

Funding

This work was supported by the U.S. National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences [grant numbers R01 ES016932, R01 ES017022, and P30ES017885], the U.S. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) T42 OH008455, the Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnologia (CONACyT) de Mexico (National Council on Science and Technology of Mexico), the Elizabeth Crosby Award from the University of Michigan, and the University of Michigan School of Public Health.

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Authors

Contributions

All authors contributed to this paper. Data collection was performed by Marisol Castillo-Castrejon, Myrna Godines-Enriquez, Vanesa Morales-Hernández, Lilia Monroy-Ramírez de Arellano, and Felipe Vadillo-Ortega; data processing and analysis were performed by Miatta Buxton, Marisol Castillo-Castrejon, Brisa N. Sanchez, Alvaro Osornio-Vargas, Mislael Valentin-Cortes, and Marie S. O’Neill. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Miatta Buxton and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Marie S. O’Neill.

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Competing Interests

The authors have no relevant financial or non-financial interests to disclose.

Ethics approval

This study was performed in line with the ethical principles and guidelines for the protection of human subjects of research outlined in the Belmont Report. The PRINCESA study was approved by the institutional review board from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and the ethics committees at the Hospital Materno Infantil Inguaran and the National Autonomous University of Mexico, Mexico City. The Institutional Review Board approval number for the project is HUM00023514.

Consent to participate

Details of the study, including purpose, expected duration, potential risks and benefits, and procedures were provided to eligible participants, who were then invited to ask questions about the study. Subsequently, written consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Buxton, M.A., Castillo-Castrejon, M., Godines-Enriquez, M. et al. The pregnancy research on inflammation, nutrition, & city environment: systematic analyses study (PRINCESA) cohort, 2009–2015. Eur J Epidemiol 38, 1009–1018 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10654-023-01040-1

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