Parental occupational exposure to pesticides at birth and risk of adult testicular germ cell tumours in offspring: a French nationwide case-control study.

Authors

Adèle Paul, Aurélie Danjou, Astrid Coste, Hans Kromhout, Marie Lefevre, Johan Spinosi, Brigitte Dananché, Ann Olsson, Céline Lamouroux, Margot Guth, Rémi Béranger, Olivia Pérol, Helen Boyle, Christel Hersant, Vanessa Loup-Cabaniols, Segolene Veau, Jeanne Perrin, Joachim Schüz, Barbara Charbotel, Béatrice Fervers, TESTIS study group

Published in

Occupational and environmental medicine. Jun 22, 2026. Epub Jun 22, 2026.

Abstract

To assess the association between parental occupational pesticide exposures at birth and adult testicular germ cell tumour (TGCT) by histological subtype and the agreement between two pesticide job-exposure matrices (JEM).
TGCT cases (n=454) and matched controls (n=670) aged 18-45 years were recruited from 20 French university hospitals into the TESTIS national case-control study. Paternal and maternal jobs at birth were obtained from interviews of participants and their mothers/relatives and coded into official nomenclatures (International Standard Classification of Occupations, French nomenclature of activity-1999). Two complementary JEMs, ALOHA+ and FRIJEM, assessed occupational exposure to all pesticides, herbicides, insecticides, fungicides with ALOHA+ for each parent by linking job titles to JEM-derived probability and intensity estimates (no/low/high). Cohen's Kappa coefficient (κ) assessed their agreement. ORs and 95% CIs comparing exposure and levels of exposure with no exposure were estimated using conditional logistic regression adjusted for literature-based covariates statistically associated with TGCT and stratified by histological subtypes.
Agreement between ALOHA+and FRIJEM was moderate to substantial (κ 0.52-0.80). A statistically non-significant higher TGCT risk was observed for high paternal occupational pesticide exposure with ALOHA+ (OR 1.95, CI 0.98 to 3.84) and FRIJEM (OR 1.70, CI 0.88 to 3.28). With ALOHA+, statistically significant positive associations were seen for high paternal occupational exposure to herbicides (overall: OR 4.23, CI 1.75 to 10.22; seminomas: OR 4.78, CI 1.79 to 12.77; non-seminomas: OR 3.53, CI 1.21 to 10.3) and fungicides (overall: OR 2.09, CI 1.05 to 4.18; seminomas: OR 2.31, CI 1.02 to 5.23). No statistically significant associations were observed for other levels of paternal exposure or pesticide groups nor for maternal exposure.
Only high paternal occupational exposure to pesticides at birth, especially herbicides and fungicides, was positively associated with TGCT.

PMID:
42331594
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 23 Jun 2026.

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