IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v18y2021i2p607-d479111.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Ethylene Oxide Exposure in U.S. Populations Residing Near Sterilization and Other Industrial Facilities: Context Based on Endogenous and Total Equivalent Concentration Exposures

Author

Listed:
  • Patrick J. Sheehan

    (Health Sciences, Exponent, Inc., Oakland, CA 94612, USA)

  • Ryan C. Lewis

    (Health Sciences, Exponent, Inc., Oakland, CA 94612, USA)

  • Christopher R. Kirman

    (Summit Toxicology, Bozeman, MT 59722, USA)

  • Heather N. Watson

    (Data Sciences, Exponent, Inc., Menlo Park, CA 94025, USA)

  • Eric D. Winegar

    (Health Sciences, Exponent, Inc., Oakland, CA 94612, USA)

  • James S. Bus

    (Health Sciences, Exponent, Inc., Alexandria, VA 22314, USA)

Abstract

Given ubiquitous human exposure to ethylene oxide (EO), regardless of occupation or geography, the current risk-specific concentrations (RSCs: 0.0001–0.01 ppb) from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) cancer risk assessment for EO are not useful metrics for managing EO exposures to the general U.S. population. The magnitude of the RSCs for EO are so low, relative to typical endogenous equivalent metabolic concentrations (1.1–5.5 ppb) that contribute ~93% of total exposure, that the RSCs provide little utility in identifying excess environmental exposures that might increase cancer risk. EO monitoring data collected in the vicinity of eight EO-emitting facilities and corresponding background locations were used to characterize potential excess exogenous concentrations. Both 50th and 90th percentile exogenous exposure concentrations were combined with the 50th percentile endogenous exposure concentration for the nonsmoking population, and then compared to percentiles of total equivalent concentration for this population. No potential total exposure concentration for these local populations exceeded the normal total equivalent concentration 95th percentile, indicating that excess facility-related exposures are unlikely to require additional management to protect public health.

Suggested Citation

  • Patrick J. Sheehan & Ryan C. Lewis & Christopher R. Kirman & Heather N. Watson & Eric D. Winegar & James S. Bus, 2021. "Ethylene Oxide Exposure in U.S. Populations Residing Near Sterilization and Other Industrial Facilities: Context Based on Endogenous and Total Equivalent Concentration Exposures," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(2), pages 1-13, January.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:2:p:607-:d:479111
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/2/607/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/2/607/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ryan C. Lewis & Patrick J. Sheehan & Christopher G. DesAutels & Heather N. Watson & Christopher R. Kirman, 2022. "Monitored and Modeled Ambient Air Concentrations of Ethylene Oxide: Contextualizing Health Risk for Potentially Exposed Populations in Georgia," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(6), pages 1-16, March.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:2:p:607-:d:479111. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.