ArticleInternational journal of hygiene and environmental health2018
Comprehension and perceptions of study participants upon receiving perfluoroalkyl substance exposure biomarker results.
Article in International journal of hygiene and environmental health, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT02295085 (Fernald Community Cohort - 18 Year Observational Study with Bio Banked Blood and Urine Samples), which is not on this map. Cited by 7 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Fernald Community Cohort - 18 Year Observational Study with Bio Banked Blood and Urine Samples
Who cites it
7 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 12 citations in OpenAlex.
- Strategies to facilitate the report-back of research results: a systematic review of methods and evaluations.Environmental health : a global access science source · 2026Pooled it
- Outcomes from Returning Individual versus Only Study-Wide Biomonitoring Results in an Environmental Exposure Study Using the Digital Exposure Report-Back Interface (DERBI).Environmental health perspectives · 2021Trial
- Moving Forward with Reporting Back Individual Environmental Health Research Results.Environmental health perspectives · 2023Article
- Article
- User-Centred Design of a Final Results Report for Participants in Multi-Sensor Personal Air Pollution Exposure Monitoring Campaigns.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Article
- MCR: Open-Source Software to Automate Compilation of Health Study Report-Back.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Article
- Untangling the ethical intersection of epidemiology, human subjects research, and public health.Annals of epidemiology · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundMeasurement of environmental biomarkers in biomedia is increasingly used as a method of exposure characterization in human population studies. Reporting the results of biomarker measurements back to study participants has been controversial, including questions of ethics and whether the study participants would want to receive and would understand the results.
methodsRecently we mailed individual measurements of two serum biomarkers, perfluorooctanoate (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS) to participants in three exposure studies of persons living in the Ohio River Valley, of whom 60 were parents of children who had been sampled. Many had serum concentrations of PFOA above the US population 95th percentile value. Reporting forms used in the three studies were somewhat different (either tables or charts for comparison to US population values) and varied in complexity. With all reports, we included information about concentrations of PFOA and PFOS in the general population, and a survey designed to ascertain the opinions of the study participants about the information they received.
resultsApproximately 33% (273/821) returned the survey, and of those, 96% reported that they were pleased that we had sent them the report. Most (86%) responded that the results were easy to understand and the enclosed fact sheet was helpful in answering questions (87%). Regarding the amount of information, most felt that we provided the "right amount" (78%) but some "too much" (7%) and some "too little" (15%). The majority (53%) were surprised at their serum concentrations. Of those with serum values > 13.0 ng/mL, 74% responded that they thought their serum concentration was "high", but only 22% of those with serum concentrations ≤5.6 responded that their concentration was "low". Surprisingly, many talked to no one about their levels; those who did were most likely to discuss the report with family members.
conclusionsReporting back individual environmental biomarker results is generally well received by study participants, and those with high concentrations perceived them to be high. Questions remain as to why study participants did not discuss their results with others.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.