Article Text
Abstract
Purpose Effects of fetal, perinatal and childhood environment on the health of children at birth and during later life have become a topic of concern. The Aichi regional sub-cohort of the Japan Environment and Children’s Study (JECS-A) is an ongoing birth cohort of pregnant women and their children which has been used to provide unique data, as adjunct studies of JECS, on multifaceted potential factors affecting children’s health.
Participants The JECS-A is part of the JECS which follows a total of 100 000 pairs of children and their mothers (fathers’ participation is optional) across 15 regions in Japan. In JECS-A, of the 8134 pregnant women living in Ichinomiya City and Nagoya City, Japan, a total of 5721 pregnant women and their 5554 children were included. Sociodemographic and psychological data as well as biological specimens were collected from the pregnant women and their spouses (if available) in the cohort during their pregnancy. Information on children included in the JECS-A was collected from their mothers and includes demographic, behavioural, childcare, psychological and psychiatric data. Urine extracted from disposable diapers and anthropometric data were also obtained from the children.
Findings to date A similar distribution trend for age at delivery was confirmed between the pregnant women enrolled in the JECS-A and the national statistics of the relevant areas. However, differences in education level and household income were observed. A total of 5502 children remained in the cohort at 18 months after delivery. Compared with the national statistics, the basic demographics of the children in the cohort represented the population in the study areas.
Future plans The enrolled children in the JECS-A will be followed until the age of 13 years. The studies that come from JECS-A will complement JECS and bring novel results with a high level of generalisability.
- JECS
- birth cohort
- epidemiology
- JECS-A
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Footnotes
Contributors TE designed the JECS-A cohort architecture, developed the protocol, analysed the data and wrote the first draft of the manuscript. YY and MT organised the study team, obtained approvals and contributed to the development of the protocol, design and data collection tools. TOm was in charge of co-ordination with relevant organisations and organised the JECS-A members. NS, SK, TMa and TOg performed the analysis and interpreted the data. YI, HS, NO and JU designed and developed the protocol for the JECS-A sub-cohorts A2, A3 and B and edited and analysed the data. AN, MKo, YO, TMi, SSu, MSO and SSa designed each adjunct study, supervised the data collection and drafted the manuscript. MKa was a member of the JECS Steering Committee, was responsible for the study design and protocol, supervised the data collection and edited and drafted the manuscript. All the authors interpreted the data, contributed to the writing of the manuscript, revised it critically for important intellectual content and agreed with the final version and the findings.
Funding The Japan Environment and Children’s Study was funded by the Ministry of the Environment, Japan. This work was also supported by grants from the Environment Research and Technology Development Fund (ERTDF, No 5-1551 and 5-1851), Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) KAKENHI Grant Number 16H03733, 25293151, 25285185, 19H01078 and Grants-in-aid for research of Nagoya City University (2011-6, 2012-4, 2013-2, 2013-10, 2014-4, 2015-10, 2016-4).
Disclaimer The findings and conclusions of this article are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not represent the official views of the Japanese government.
Map disclaimer The depiction of boundaries on this map does not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of BMJ (or any member of its group) concerning the legal status of any country, territory, jurisdiction or area or of its authorities. This map is provided without any warranty of any kind, either express or implied.
Competing interests None declared.
Patient consent for publication Not required.
Ethics approval This study was approved by the Review Board of the Ministry of the Environment, by the Institutional Review Board of Nagoya City University Graduate School of Medical Sciences (No. 70-00-0134, 00000544-6, 00000574-2).
Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.
Data availability statement Data are available upon reasonable request.