The Navajo Birth Cohort Study (NBCS) is assessing the relationship among exposures to uranium waste, birth outcomes, and child development on Navajo Nation where more than 500 abandoned uranium mines (AUMs) and 1100 associated waste features remain. Exposure is extensively characterized by a combination of survey data, environmental home assessments, and biosamples.
The primary goal of this study is to better understand the relationship between uranium and environmental metal exposures with birth outcomes and children’s development on Navajo Nation.
The NIH (National Institutes of Health) ECHO (Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes) program brings separate research groups, or cohorts, from across the country together in order to better understand how early life exposures and experiences can affect child health and development. The ECHO program aims to enroll over 55,000 children across the U.S. with the mission to enhance the health of children for generations to come.
The Navajo Birth Cohort Study (NBCS), now part of the ECHO program, is called NBCS/ECHO+ and will represent more than half of all Native American children enrolled in the national study. While the NBCS continues to focus on the impacts of early life exposure to toxic metals in the environment, such as uranium and arsenic, participation in the ECHO program allows NBCS to study a broader set of health outcomes that include obesity, upper and lower airway function, birth outcomes, neurodevelopment and overall health.
ECHO-supported studies share standardized data collection methods in these five key outcome domains:
NBCS/ECHO+ is currently recruiting!
NBCS/ECHO publications March 2020 – February 2023
Nozadi SS, Li X, Kong X, Rennie B, Kanda D, MacKenzie D, Luo L, Posner J, Blackwell CK, Croen LA, Ferrara A. Effects of COVID-19 Financial and Social Hardships on Infants’ and Toddlers’ Development in the ECHO Program. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2023 Jan 5;20(2):1013
https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph20021013
Beene D, Collender P, Cardenas A, Harvey C, Huhmann L, Lin Y, Lewis J, LoIacono N, Navas-Acien A, Nigra A, Steinmaus C. A mass-balance approach to evaluate As intake and excretion in different populations. Environment international. 2022;v. 166:pp. 107371. PMID: 35809487.
https://pubag.nal.usda.gov/catalog/7813912
Thompson González N, Ong J, Luo L, MacKenzie D. Chronic Community Exposure to Environmental Metal Mixtures Is Associated with Selected Cytokines in the Navajo Birth Cohort Study (NBCS). International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2022 Nov 13;19(22):14939.
https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph192214939
Erdei, E., Qeadan, F., Miller, C., Kanda, D., Luo, L., Gonzales, M., Lewis, J. and MacKenzie, D., 2022. Environmental uranium exposures and cytokine profiles among mother-newborn baby pairs from the Navajo birth cohort study. Toxicology and Applied Pharmacology, p.116292.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36270330/
Bastain, T.M., Knapp, E.A., Law, A., Algermissen, M., Avalos, L.A., Birnhak, Z., Blackwell, C., Breton, C.V., Duarte, C., Frazier, J., Ganiban, J., Greenwood, P., Herbstman, J., Hernandez-Castro, I., Lewis, J., et al.; COVID-19 Pandemic Experiences and Symptoms of Pandemic-Related Traumatic Stress Among Mothers in the United States. JAMA Network Open. Accepted November 2022.
https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.47330
Choi J, Leventhal BL, Bishop S, Rennie B, Leckie A, Geib E, Davis J, Wegele A, Roman C, Lewis J, MacKenzie D. Validation of the Child Behavior Checklist and Achenbach Test Observation Form for Use With Native American Children in the Navajo Nation. InAACAP/CACAP 2022 Annual Meeting 2022 Oct 21. AACAP.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaac.2022.09.353
Nozadi S., Aguiar A., Du R., Enright E., Schantz S., Miller C., Rennie B., Quetawki M., Mackenzie D., Lewis J. Cross Cultural Applicability of Eye-Tracking in Assessing Attention to Emotional Faces in Preschool-Aged Children. Emotion. 2022 Sept 15.
https://doi.org/10.1037/emo0001124
Du R., Luo L., Hudson L.G., Nozadi S., and Lewis J. An adjusted partial least squares regression framework to embrace additional exposure relationship information to improve for environmental mixture data analysis. Journal of Applied Statistics 2022 Mar 5:1-22.
https://doi.org/10.1080/02664763.2022.2043254
Howe CG, Nozadi SS, Garcia E, O'Connor TG, Starling AP, Farzan SF, Jackson BP, Madan JC, Alshawabkeh AN, Cordero JF, Bastain TM. Prenatal metal (loid) mixtures and birth weight for gestational age: A pooled analysis of three cohorts participating in the ECHO program. Environment International. 2022 Mar 1;161:107102.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2022.107102
Nozadi S.S., Li L., Luo L, MacKenzie D., Erdei E., Du R, Roman C, Hoover J, O’Donald E, Burnette C., and Lewis J. Prenatal metal exposures and infants’ developmental outcomes in a Navajo population. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2022 Jan 19(1): 425
https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19010425
Shaw JL, Semmens E, Okihiro M, Lewis JL, Hirschfeld M, VanWagoner TM, Stephens L, Easa D, Ross JL, Graham N, Watson SE. Best Practices for Conducting Clinical Trials With Indigenous Children in the United States. American Journal of Public Health. 2021 Aug 26(0):e1-9.
https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/abs/10.2105/AJPH.2021.306372
Walker, E.S., Noonan, C.W., Semmens, E.O., Ware, D., Smith, P., Boyer, B.B., Erdei E., Hopkins, S.E., Lewis, J., Belcourt, A., and Ward, T.J. 2021. Indoor fine particulate matter and demographic, household, and wood stove characteristics among rural US homes heated with wood fuel. Indoor Air. 00:1-16.
https://doi.org/10.1111/ina.12808
Faro, E., Sauder, K., Anderson, A, Dunlop, A., Kerver, J., McGrath, M., Roary, M., Roman, C., Weidinger, C., and Huddleston, K. 2021. Characteristics of ECHO Cohorts Recruited During Pregnancy. The American Journal of Maternal Child Nursing. 2021 May 12.
https://doi.org/10.1097/NMC.0000000000000725
Schantz, S.L., Eskenazi, B., Buckley, J.P., Braun, J.M., Sprowles, J.N., Bennett, D.H., Cordero, J., Frazier, J.A., Lewis, J., Hertz-Picciotto, I., Lyall, K., Nozadi, S.S., …& Watkins D.J. 2020. A framework for assessing the impact of chemical exposures on neurodevelopment in ECHO: Opportunities and challenges. Environmental research, p.109709.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2020.109709
Bush, N.R., Wakschlag, L.S., LeWinn, K.Z., Hertz-Picciotto, I., Nozadi, S.S., Pieper, S., Lewis, J., Biezonski, D., Blair, C., Deardorff, J. and Neiderhiser, J.M., 2020. Family environment, neurodevelopmental risk, and the environmental influences on child health outcomes (ECHO) initiative: Looking back and moving forward. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 11, p.547.
https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2020.00547
Hoover, Joseph H., Erdei, Esther, Begay, David, Gonzales, Melissa, Jarrett, Jeffery M., Cheng, Po-Yung, and Lewis, Johnnye, Exposure to uranium and co-occurring metals among pregnant Navajo women. Environmental Research, 2020. 190: p. 109943.
10.1016/j.envres.2020.109943
Quetawki, M., Placental Transfer, July 2020 Cover Image based on "Diet quality among pregnant women in the Navajo Birth Cohort Study, De La Rosa et al. 2020" Maternal & Child Nutrition.
https://doi.org/10.1111/mcn.13051