ArticleEpidemiology (Cambridge, Mass.)2019
Do Post-breast Cancer Diagnosis Toenail Trace Element Concentrations Reflect Prediagnostic Concentrations?
Article in Epidemiology (Cambridge, Mass.), 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 19 papers.
What it found
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Who cites it
19 citing papers in PubMed, 27 citations in OpenAlex.
- Assessing Lead Exposure by Biological Matrices Analysis and Links to Breast Cancer: A Critical Review of Experimental and Epidemiological Findings.European journal of breast health · 2025Article
- Causal relationship between blood metal levels and breast cancer risk: a Mendelian randomization study in East Asian populations.Discover oncology · 2025Article
- Exposure to metal mixtures and telomere length in Bangladeshi children.American journal of epidemiology · 2025Article
- Article
- Parental arsenic exposure and tissue-specific DNA methylation in Bangladeshi infants with spina bifida.Epigenetics · 2024Article
- Maternal arsenic exposure modifies associations between arsenic, folate and arsenic metabolism gene variants, and spina bifida risk: A case‒control study in Bangladesh.Environmental research · 2024Article
- Arsenic exposure and measures of glucose tolerance in Bangladeshi adults: A cross-sectional study.Environmental epidemiology (Philadelphia, Pa.) · 2024Article
- Seasonal patterns in trace elements assessed in toenails.Environmental advances · 2024Article
- Toenail and serum levels as biomarkers of iron status in pre- and postmenopausal women: correlations and stability over eight-year follow-up.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Biomonitoring of inorganic arsenic species in pregnancy.Journal of exposure science & environmental epidemiology · 2023Review
- Reliability of low mass toenail samples as biomarkers of chronic metal exposure.Journal of exposure science & environmental epidemiology · 2023Article
- Metals and Breast Cancer Risk: A Prospective Study Using Toenail Biomarkers.American journal of epidemiology · 2021Article
- Keratinous biomarker of mercury exposure associated with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis risk in a nationwide U.S. study.Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis & frontotemporal degeneration · 2020Article
- Toenail metal concentrations and age at menopause: A prospective study.Environmental epidemiology (Philadelphia, Pa.) · 2020Article
- Metals and trace elements in relation to body mass index in a prospective study of US women.Environmental research · 2020Article
- A Quantile-Based g-Computation Approach to Addressing the Effects of Exposure Mixtures.Environmental health perspectives · 2020Article
- Toenail-Based Metal Concentrations and Young-Onset Breast Cancer.American journal of epidemiology · 2019Article
- Toenail-Based Metal Concentrations and Young-Onset Breast Cancer.American journal of epidemiology · 2019Article
- Urine and toenail cadmium levels in pregnant women: A reliability study.Environment international · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundExposure to trace elements may affect health, including breast cancer risk. Trace element levels in toenails are potentially useful biomarkers of exposure, but their reliability is not established. We assessed the reproducibility of toenail element concentrations over time and whether concentrations change following a breast cancer diagnosis.
methodsWe assessed trace element levels in toenails collected at two time points from 221 women (111 with and 110 without an intervening breast cancer diagnosis). We measured levels of arsenic, cadmium, chromium, cobalt, copper, iron, mercury, manganese, molybdenum, nickel, lead, antimony, selenium, tin, vanadium, and zinc using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry in samples collected at baseline and 4-10 years later. We compared trace element concentrations over time using Spearman's rank correlation coefficient (R). We used linear models to examine the magnitude and direction of changes and the influence of a breast cancer diagnosis.
resultsOverall, we observed positive correlations (R = 0.18-0.71) between paired samples for all trace elements. However, nickel (R = -0.02) and antimony (R = 0.12) were not correlated among cases. We observed decreases in cadmium, chromium, mercury, manganese, molybdenum, nickel, and lead between baseline and follow-up, but case status was unrelated to these changes. The declines are consistent with decreases over calendar time rather than age time.
conclusionsToenail trace element concentrations were correlated over time, but many elements showed systematic decreases by calendar year. Aside from nickel and antimony, postdiagnostic toenail levels correlated with prediagnostic levels, providing support for using postdiagnostic toenail samples in retrospective studies.
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