Abstract
The hemoglobin adduct of the human bladder carcinogen 4-aminobiphenyl (4ABP-Hb) declined in the blood of 34 smokers enrolled in a withdrawal program, from a mean of 120 ± 7 (SE) pg/g of hemoglobin at the start to a mean of 82 ± 6 pg/g after 3 weeks and a mean of 34 ± 5 pg/g among the 15 exsmokers who had not resumed smoking after 2 months. Although 4ABP-Hb declined faster than expected under the assumption that the human erythrocyte has a life span of 120 days, it persisted much longer than cotinine. Therefore, 4ABP-Hb may complement the use of cotinine as a marker of exposure to tobacco smoke. The strength of the within-person association of 4ABP-Hb with smoking, coupled with the weakness of the between-person association (correlation coefficient, 0.33), is evidence that between-person variation in modifying factors is substantial. Study of the modifiers of 4ABP-Hb levels may help elucidate the etiology of human susceptibility to aromatic amine-induced bladder cancer.
Footnotes
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↵1 This investigation was supported by American Cancer Society Special Institutional Grant 10-II and NIH Grants ES00597 and 2-T32-ES07020.
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↵2 To whom requests for reprints should be addressed, at Department of Epidemiology, Harvard School of Public Health, 677 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02115.
- Received June 19, 1989.
- Revision received September 21, 1989.
- Accepted October 2, 1989.
- ©1990 American Association for Cancer Research.
Volume 50, Issue 1
