Published January 25, 2018 | Version 2.0
Project deliverable Open

Report on opportunities and obstacles of combining HBM and health studies, availability of health studies with biological samples, availability of administrative registers, and guidelines for combining HBM and health studies. Deliverable Report D 11.1

Creators

  • 1. Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), Finland
  • 2. Region Hovedstaden - The Capital Region of Denmark, Denmark
  • 3. Azienda Sataria Locale Roma, Italy
  • 4. Istituto Superiore di Sanita, Italy
  • 5. Umeå University, Sweden
  • 6. Karolinska Institutet, Sweden
  • 7. WIS-ISP, Belgium
  • 8. National Institute of Health Dr. Ricardo Jorge (INSA), Portugal
  • 9. Ustav Zdravotnickych Informaci a Statistiky Ceske Republiky, Czech Republic
  • 10. Medizinsche Univeritaet Wien, Austria
  • 11. Copenhagen University, Denmark
  • 12. Suddansk Universitet, Denmark
  • 13. VITO, Belgium
  • 14. Fraunhofer Gesellschaft zür Foerderung der Angewandten Forschunge E.B., Germany
  • 15. Hellenic Health Foundation, Freece
  • 16. Norwegian National Institute for Public Health, Norway
  • 17. Agence Nationale de Sante Publique, France
  • 18. Faculdade de Medicina da Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal
  • 19. Umweltbundesamt (UBA), Germany

Description

The European Human Biomonitoring Initiative (HBM4EU) is a joint effort of 28 countries (24 European Member States, three associated countries and Switzerland), the European Environment Agency and the European Commission, co-funded under Horizon 2020.

The main objective of HBM4EU is to use human biomonitoring (HBM) to assess human exposure to chemicals in Europe in order to better understand the associated health impacts and to improve chemical risk assessment. HBM4EU will generate knowledge on chemical exposure levels in the population and their health effects.

In parallel to HBM studies, health examination surveys (HES) are conducted in many European countries. HES are surveys where information collected by questionnaire(s) is complemented with information obtained by physical measurements such as blood pressure and anthropometric measurements, and by analysis of biomarkers from biological samples. The European Health Examination Survey (EHES) was established in 2010 to coordinate the development of national HESs in Europe. Between 2000 and 2017, 15 European countries have conducted a national HES and in many countries smaller, regional or disease specific surveys have been carried out.

Since for both HBM studies and HESs, data is collected through fieldwork which is one of the largest expenses for such studies and needed infrastructures are very similar, the potential to combine these two types of studies has been considered. This could result in more cost-effective ways to conduct health and environmental monitoring. In some countries, such as Germany, Israel and France, this combination has already been done at national or regional level.

Human biomonitoring and health studies have a lot of similarities in terms of the infrastructure and procedures required for their implementation. However, in practice, the opportunity for adding a HBM module to an ongoing/planned health study (and vice versa) is rarely used. Reasons for this may be multifarious and may differ from country to country, and between different study settings.

This report will look at different aspects related to combining HBM and health studies, together with possibilities for mortality and morbidity follow-up through linkage to administrative registers. Also possibilities to use biological samples collected in previous health studies and stored for future use in biobanks for analysis of HBM biomarkers will be reviewed. Therefore, this report has four main parts:

  • Part A. Opportunities and obstacles of combining HBM and health studies
  • Part B. Availability of administrative registers and possibilities for their use in HBM studies • Part C. Guidelines for linking HBM and health studies
  • Part D. Criteria for the use of existing biological samples from health studies for HBM analysis

Feasibility studies will be conducted on the integration of HBM and health studies, in order to identify further both synergies and obstacles that can emerge during the preparation and implementation of fieldwork studies in different settings and across different national infrastructures. A workshop to explore the synergies and obstacles related to the combination of HBM and health studies will be organized in June 2018. In coming years, this report will be updated based on knowledge gained from feasibility studies.

Files

Deliverable-11.1-Report-on-opportunities-and-obstacles-of-combining-HBM-and-health-studies-availability-of-health-studies-with-biological-samples-availability-of-administrative-registers-and-guidelines-for-combi (4).pdf

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Additional details

Funding

European Commission
HBM4EU - European Human Biomonitoring Initiative 733032