Relation between cadmium exposure and gestational diabetes mellitus

Cadmium (Cd) has been associated with type 2 diabetes in general population. However, the role of Cd in the occurrence of Gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) remains unclear.

Our study was aimed at investigating whether Cd exposure during pregnancy was associated with increased risk of GDM.

Cd concentrations were measured in urine samples from 6837 pregnant women in Wuhan, China, from 2012 to 2014. A "modified Poisson" model with a robust error variance was used to examine the association of GDM with continuous natural logarithm (ln) transformed urinary Cd or quartiles of urinary Cd levels.

For about 3-fold increase in Cd concentrations, there were 16% [relative risk (RR) =1.16; 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.03, 1.33] increase in risk of GDM. Compared with women in the lowest quartile of urinary Cd levels, women in the highest quartile had 1.30 higher risk of GDM [95% CI: 1.05, 1.61; p-trend <0.05]. Further analyses indicated overweight/obese women with higher urinary Cd levels had significantly higher risk of GDM, compared with women in the reference category of lowest quartile of Cd and normal pre-pregnancy body mass index [RR =2.71; 95% CI: 1.81, 4.07].

Our study presented a significantly positive association between urinary Cd levels and risk of GDM, supporting the hypothesis that environmental exposure to Cd may contribute to the development of GDM.