The tool used to analyze the literature for an overall summary of risk of a connection between in utero inhalational exposure to organic solvents and adverse pregnancy outcome is meta-analysis. Study size ranged from 570 to 2950 patients. Study size ranged from 57 to 1096 patients. Addition of one study of similar effect size would have rendered this trend statistically significant. Some considerations must be borne in mind when interpreting results of these meta-analyses.
Organic solvents belong to many classes of chemicals.
Not all studies examined exactly the same groups of solvents nor the same extent and range of solvents nor the same frequency and duration of exposure. As well, the malformations listed in the two papers seem to reflect a diverse range of anomalies. We might expect to notice a particular trend in malformations between the studies, but this does not appear to be the case. Prudent action Our review of the literature reveals that, to the best of our knowledge, no studies prospectively examine occupational exposure to organic solvents during pregnancy in relation to pregnancy outcome, especially with regard to malformations. Because of the potential implications of this review to a large number of women of reproductive age, it will be important to verify this cumulative risk estimate with a prospective study.