Comparison between air pollution concentrations measured at the nearest monitoring station to the delivery hospital and those measured at stations nearest the residential postal code regions of pregnant women in Fukuoka

Environmental Health and Preventive Medicine, Jun 2017

Background Numerous earlier studies examining the association of air pollution with maternal and foetal health estimated maternal exposure to air pollutants based on the women’s residential addresses. However, residential addresses, which are personally identifiable information, are not always obtainable. Since a majority of pregnant women reside near their delivery hospitals, the concentrations of air pollutants at the respective delivery hospitals may be surrogate markers of pollutant exposure at home. We compared air pollutant concentrations measured at the nearest monitoring station to Kyushu University Hospital with those measured at the closest monitoring stations to the respective residential postal code regions of pregnant women in Fukuoka. Methods Aggregated postal code data for the home addresses of pregnant women who delivered at Kyushu University Hospital in 2014 was obtained from Kyushu University Hospital. For each of the study’s 695 women who resided in Fukuoka Prefecture, we assigned pollutant concentrations measured at the nearest monitoring station to Kyushu University Hospital and pollutant concentrations measured at the nearest monitoring station to their respective residential postal code regions. Results Among the 695 women, 584 (84.0%) resided in the proximity of the nearest monitoring station to hospital or one of the four other stations (as the nearest stations to their respective residential postal code region) in Fukuoka city. Pearson’s correlation for daily mean concentrations among the monitoring stations in Fukuoka city was strong for fine particulate matter (PM2.5), suspended particulate matter (SPM), and photochemical oxidants (Ox) (coefficients ≥0.9), but moderate for coarse particulate matter (the result of subtracting the PM2.5 from the SPM concentrations), nitrogen dioxide, and sulphur dioxide. Hospital-based and residence-based concentrations of PM2.5, SPM, and Ox were comparable. Conclusions For PM2.5, SPM, and Ox, exposure estimation based on the delivery hospital is likely to approximate that based on the home of pregnant women.

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Comparison between air pollution concentrations measured at the nearest monitoring station to the delivery hospital and those measured at stations nearest the residential postal code regions of pregnant women in Fukuoka

Michikawa et al. Environmental Health and Preventive Medicine Comparison between air pollution concentrations measured at the nearest monitoring station to the delivery hospital and those measured at stations nearest the residential postal code regions of pregnant women in Fukuoka Takehiro Michikawa 0 2 Seiichi Morokuma 1 2 Hiroshi Nitta 0 2 Kiyoko Kato 1 2 Shin Yamazaki 0 2 0 Environmental Epidemiology Section, Centre for Health and Environmental Risk Research, National Institute for Environmental Studies , 16-2 Onogawa, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8506 , Japan 1 Department of Obstetrics 2 Gynaecology, Kyushu University Hospital, Kyushu University , 3-1-1 Maidashi, Higashi-ku, Fukuoka 812-8582 , Japan Background: Numerous earlier studies examining the association of air pollution with maternal and foetal health estimated maternal exposure to air pollutants based on the women's residential addresses. However, residential addresses, which are personally identifiable information, are not always obtainable. Since a majority of pregnant women reside near their delivery hospitals, the concentrations of air pollutants at the respective delivery hospitals may be surrogate markers of pollutant exposure at home. We compared air pollutant concentrations measured at the nearest monitoring station to Kyushu University Hospital with those measured at the closest monitoring stations to the respective residential postal code regions of pregnant women in Fukuoka. Methods: Aggregated postal code data for the home addresses of pregnant women who delivered at Kyushu University Hospital in 2014 was obtained from Kyushu University Hospital. For each of the study's 695 women who resided in Fukuoka Prefecture, we assigned pollutant concentrations measured at the nearest monitoring station to Kyushu University Hospital and pollutant concentrations measured at the nearest monitoring station to their respective residential postal code regions. Results: Among the 695 women, 584 (84.0%) resided in the proximity of the nearest monitoring station to hospital or one of the four other stations (as the nearest stations to their respective residential postal code region) in Fukuoka city. Pearson's correlation for daily mean concentrations among the monitoring stations in Fukuoka city was strong for fine particulate matter (PM2.5), suspended particulate matter (SPM), and photochemical oxidants (Ox) (coefficients ≥0.9), but moderate for coarse particulate matter (the result of subtracting the PM2.5 from the SPM concentrations), nitrogen dioxide, and sulphur dioxide. Hospital-based and residence-based concentrations of PM2.5, SPM, and Ox were comparable. Conclusions: For PM2.5, SPM, and Ox, exposure estimation based on the delivery hospital is likely to approximate that based on the home of pregnant women. Air pollution; Monitoring station; Pregnant woman; Validation - Background There is increasing evidence for an association between air pollution and maternal and foetal health. Since the health effects of air pollution are relatively small, a large sample size is required in order to investigate this association. Therefore, numerous earlier studies used registry data to increase the number of the participants [1–7]. In such a study design, however, personal exposure to respirable pollutants could not be measured. Thus, individual exposure to air pollutants at the participants’ home addresses has been estimated based on concentrations measured at nearby ambient air monitoring stations or on a statistical model similar to land use regression models [3–7]. Our research question is whether recent air pollution in Japan influences maternal and foetal health. In Japan, however, there is no nationwide public registry data that includes sufficient information on outcome and confounders related to maternal and foetal health. Accumulated data regarding maternal and foetal health may be available if we collaborate with obstetric health care providers. Even in this case, however, we cannot collect relevant personally identifiable information, (i.e. residential addresses) to estimate maternal exposure to air pollutants, without informed consent from the subjects [8], and it is not easy to receive such informed consent from women who have given birth and completed the obstetric follow-up process. However, we may have access to anonymised information including relevant data on pregnant women who delivered at cooperating hospitals. Although anonymised data does not allow us to estimate residence-based maternal exposure to pollutants, a majority of pregnant women reside near their delivery hospitals in Japan [9, 10]. Based on the assumption, then, that pregnant women reside near their delivery hospital, we may be able to use the air pollutant concentrations at the respective delivery hospitals as surrogate markers of pollutant exposure at their homes. Our a priori hypothesis is that pollutant exposure estimation based on the delivery hospital approximates e (...truncated)


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Takehiro Michikawa, Seiichi Morokuma, Hiroshi Nitta, Kiyoko Kato, Shin Yamazaki. Comparison between air pollution concentrations measured at the nearest monitoring station to the delivery hospital and those measured at stations nearest the residential postal code regions of pregnant women in Fukuoka, Environmental Health and Preventive Medicine, 2017, pp. 55, Volume 22, Issue 1, DOI: 10.1186/s12199-017-0663-2