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Grantee Research Project Results

2013 Progress Report: Novel Estimates of Pollutant Mixtures and Pediatric Health in Two Birth Cohorts

EPA Grant Number: R834799C003
Subproject: this is subproject number 003 , established and managed by the Center Director under grant R834799
(EPA does not fund or establish subprojects; EPA awards and manages the overall grant for this center).

Center: The Southeastern Center for Air Pollution and Epidemiology: Multiscale Measurements and Modeling of Mixtures
Center Director: Tolbert, Paige
Title: Novel Estimates of Pollutant Mixtures and Pediatric Health in Two Birth Cohorts
Investigators: Strickland, Matthew J , Russell, Armistead G. , Mulholland, James , Waller, Lance , Darrow, Lyndsey , Klein, Mitchel , Guensler, Randy , Davis, Robert , Liu, Yang
Current Investigators: Strickland, Matthew J , Russell, Armistead G. , Chang, Howard , Mulholland, James , Waller, Lance , Darrow, Lyndsey , Klein, Mitchel , Guensler, Randy , Liu, Yang
Institution: Emory University , Georgia Institute of Technology
Current Institution: Emory University , Georgia Institute of Technology , University of Nevada - Reno
EPA Project Officer: Chung, Serena
Project Period: January 1, 2011 through December 31, 2016
Project Period Covered by this Report: August 1, 2012 through July 31,2013
RFA: Clean Air Research Centers (2009) RFA Text |  Recipients Lists
Research Category: Human Health , Air

Objective:

In utero and early life experiences affect physiological development and can influence sensitivity to environmental factors throughout life. In this Project we explore the interplay between certain early life events, characterizations of air pollutant mixtures developed as part of the Center’s Mixtures Characterization Toolkit, and a range of pediatric health outcomes using two large, population-based birth cohorts. One cohort consists of roughly 1.7 million Georgia birth records that have been geocoded to the Census block level and linked with pediatric emergency department visits by staff at the Georgia Department of Human Resources. Using this statewide birth cohort, we are investigating acute effects of air pollution mixtures on respiratory health outcomes and ear infections in children, and we are assessing whether children who were born premature or low birth weight are more sensitive to ambient air pollutant concentrations than their counterparts. Further, we are using the statewide birth cohort to investigate whether ambient air pollutant mixtures during pregnancy are associated with the risk of preterm delivery or reduced birth weight. The second birth cohort is comprised of children who were members of the Kaiser Permanente Georgia Health Maintenance Organization in metropolitan Atlanta. In this birth cohort, where comprehensive medical and residential histories are available for each study subject, we will examine whether air pollutant mixtures during the first year of life are associated with the incidence of childhood asthma.

Progress Summary:

We have 1,705,130 individual-level birth records from 1994-2006 for Georgia. We have 8,252,996 individual-level emergency department visits among children age 0-18 years during 2002-2010 for Georgia and we have 2,458,950 individual-level hospital records for children age 0-18 years during 1999-2010 for Georgia.
 
Construction of the Kaiser Permanente historical birth cohort is ongoing and will be finalized later in 2013. There are 24,607 children in the cohort. Among these children, 6,287 have 1+ clinical encounter with an ICD-9 code for asthma and 4,382 that have 2+ encounters with an ICD-9 code for asthma. In addition to ICD-9 codes we have information regarding medication dispensings. Among children with an ICD-9 code for asthma, 6,029 (95.5%) have at least one asthma-related medication. Based on these preliminary descriptive statistics it appears we will have high sensitivity to correctly identify children with asthma. We have also requested information regarding allergy test results to explore the possibility of stratifying cases into atopic vs. non-atopic asthma, although those data are pending.
 
Good progress is being made on characterizing air quality throughout Georgia. A method for fusing CMAQ model output with measurements from stationary monitors has been developed and is undergoing model evaluation. One manuscript describing the estimation of PM2.5 from satellite remote sensing data has been published (Hu et al., 2012) and two more are under review (Chang et al., submitted 2013a; Hu et al., submitted). Work to estimate biomass burning events using high resolution remote sensing data from multiple NASA satellites is ongoing. Two manuscripts describing the source apportionment of PM2.5 have been published (Balachandran et al., 2012; Maier et al., 2012) and a third is under review (Balachandran et al., submitted). Methods to calculate downscaled CMAQ estimates at 250 meter grids over longer time-periods using land use information in support of the Kaiser Permanente birth cohort study are ongoing.
 
An epidemiological methods paper on the use of classification and regression trees to estimate joint effects of pollutant mixtures is under review (Gass et al., submitted), as is a methodological paper on time-to-event regression for the identification of susceptible periods of fetal development for the impact of air pollution on gestational age (Chang et al., submitted 2013b). Continuing with our measurement error work from the previous year is a publication on the effects of error on health effect estimates in time-series studies (Strickland et al., 2013), and we are continuing to investigate the potential uses of the future variable indicator (Flanders et al., 2011) in our work. Manuscripts and analyses of the substantive associations between air pollutants and pediatric morbidity (including potential effect measure modification by gestational age) are ongoing and at various points of development; selected results of this work were shared during the May 2013 CLARC webinar and the July 2013 CLARC annual meeting.

Future Activities:

The subcontract with Kaiser Permanente is now in place and creation of the historical birth cohort is underway. We will continue to construct the cohort during the next project year and we will hopefully be able to start epidemiological analyses in early 2014. Analyses of associations between air pollution and pediatric respiratory morbidity in Atlanta are wrapping up, as are analyses of air pollution and preterm delivery in the state-wide cohort, and manuscripts based on this work will be developed. Epidemiologic analyses utilizing the source apportionment estimates are slated to begin later in 2013. Model evaluation of the CMAQ-fused estimates should be completed in the next year, and development of the downscaled CMAQ estimates will begin later in 2013.


Journal Articles on this Report : 16 Displayed | Download in RIS Format

Publications Views
Other subproject views: All 91 publications 39 publications in selected types All 37 journal articles
Other center views: All 338 publications 139 publications in selected types All 135 journal articles
Publications
Type Citation Sub Project Document Sources
Journal Article Balachandran S, Pachon JE, Hu Y, Lee D, Mulholland JA, Russell AG. Ensemble-trained source apportionment of fine particulate matter and method uncertainty analysis. Atmospheric Environment 2012;61:387-394. R834799 (2012)
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  • Journal Article Balachandran S, Chang HH, Pachon JE, Holmes HA, Mulholland JA, Russell AG. Bayesian-based ensemble source apportionment of PM2.5. Environmental Science & Technology 2013;47(23):13511-13518. R834799 (2014)
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  • Journal Article Chang HH, Reich BJ, Miranda ML. A spatial time-to-event approach for estimating associations between air pollution and preterm birth. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society--Series C (Applied Statistics) 2013;62(2):167-179. R834799 (2014)
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  • Journal Article Chang HH, Hu X, Liu Y. Calibrating MODIS aerosol optical depth for predicting daily PM2.5 concentrations via statistical downscaling. Journal of Exposure Science & Environmental Epidemiology 2014;24(4):398-404. R834799 (2014)
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  • Journal Article Flanders WD, Klein M, Darrow LA, Strickland MJ, Sarnat SE, Sarnat JA, Waller LA, Winquist A, Tolbert PE. A method to detect residual confounding in spatial and other observational studies. Epidemiology 2011;22(6):823-826. R834799 (2012)
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  • Journal Article Gass K, Klein M, Chang HH, Flanders WD, Strickland MJ. Classification and regression trees for epidemiologic research: an air pollution example. Environmental Health 2014;13(1):17 (10 pp.). R834799 (2014)
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  • Journal Article Goldman GT, Mulholland JA, Russell AG, Strickland MJ, Klein M, Waller LA, Tolbert PE. Impact of exposure measurement error in air pollution epidemiology: effect of error type in time-series studies. Environmental Health 2011;10:61 (11 pp.). R834799 (2011)
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  • Journal Article Goldman GT, Mulholland JA, Russell AG, Gass K, Strickland MJ, Tolbert PE. Characterization of ambient air pollution measurement error in a time-series health study using a geostatistical simulation approach. Atmospheric Environment 2012;57:101-108. R834799 (2012)
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  • Journal Article Hu X, Waller LA, Al-Hamdan MZ, Crosson WL, Estes Jr. MG, Estes SM, Quattrochi DA, Sarnat JA, Liu Y. Estimating ground-level PM2.5 concentrations in the southeastern U.S. using geographically weighted regression. Environmental Research 2013;121:1-10. R834799 (2013)
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  • Journal Article Hu X, Waller LA, Lyapustin A, Wang Y, Al-Hamdan MZ, Crosson WL, Estes Jr. MG, Estes SM, Quattrochi DA, Puttaswamy SJ, Liu Y. Estimating ground-level PM2.5 concentrations in the Southeastern United States using MAIAC AOD retrievals and a two-stage model. Remote Sensing of Environment 2014;140:220-232. R834799 (2014)
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  • Journal Article Pachon JE, Balachandran S, Hu Y, Mulholland JA, Darrow LA, Sarnat JA, Tolbert PE, Russell AG. Development of outcome-based, multipollutant mobile source indicators. Journal of the Air & Waste Management Association 2012;62(4):431-442. R834799 (2012)
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  • Journal Article Pearce JL, Waller LA, Mulholland JA, Sarnat SE, Strickland MJ, Chang HH, Tolbert PE. Exploring associations between multipollutant day types and asthma morbidity: epidemiologic applications of self-organizing map ambient air quality classifications. Environmental Health 2015;14:55 (12 pp.). R834799 (2015)
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  • Journal Article Reich BJ, Chang HH, Strickland MJ. Spatial health effects analysis with uncertain residential locations. Statistical Methods in Medical Research 2014;23(2):156-168. R834799 (2012)
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  • Journal Article Strickland MJ, Darrow LA, Mulholland JA, Klein M, Flanders WD, Winquist A, Tolbert PE. Implications of different approaches for characterizing ambient air pollutant concentrations within the urban airshed for time-series studies and health benefits analyses. Environmental Health 2011;10:36 (9 pp.). R834799 (2011)
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  • Journal Article Strickland MJ, Gass KM, Goldman GT, Mulholland JA. Effects of ambient air pollution measurement error on health effect estimates in time-series studies: a simulation-based analysis. Journal of Exposure Science & Environmental Epidemiology 2015;25(2):160-166. R834799 (2013)
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  • Journal Article Waller LA. Commentary: regarding assessments of chance in investigations of ‘cluster series.’ International Journal of Epidemiology 2013;42(2):449-452. R834799 (2013)
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  • Supplemental Keywords:

    ambient air, atmosphere, health effects, human health, susceptibility, vulnerability, sensitive populations, infants, children, risk, dose-response, cumulative effects, epidemiology, exposure, public policy, air quality modeling, monitoring, measurement methods, aerosol, particulates, PM2.5, organics, elemental carbon, metals, ozone, oxidants, PAH, sulfates, source characterization, mobile sources, Georgia, GA, Southeast, Scientific Discipline, Health, Health Risk Assessment, Risk Assessments, Environmental Monitoring, Biochemistry, Atmospheric Sciences, children's health, particulate matter, ambient air monitoring, climate change, air pollution, airshed modeling, ambient particle health effects, susceptibility, human health risk

    Relevant Websites:

    Southeastern Center for Air Pollution & Epidemiology (SCAPE) Exit

    Progress and Final Reports:

    Original Abstract
  • 2011 Progress Report
  • 2012 Progress Report
  • 2014 Progress Report
  • 2015 Progress Report
  • Final Report

  • Main Center Abstract and Reports:

    R834799    The Southeastern Center for Air Pollution and Epidemiology: Multiscale Measurements and Modeling of Mixtures

    Subprojects under this Center: (EPA does not fund or establish subprojects; EPA awards and manages the overall grant for this center).
    R834799C001 Development and Deployment of an Instrumentation Suite for Comprehensive Air Quality Characterization Including Aerosol ROS
    R834799C002 Examining In-Vehicle Pollution and Oxidative Stress in a Cohort of Daily Commuters
    R834799C003 Novel Estimates of Pollutant Mixtures and Pediatric Health in Two Birth Cohorts
    R834799C004 A Multi-City Time-Series Study of Pollutant Mixtures and Acute Morbidity

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    The perspectives, information and conclusions conveyed in research project abstracts, progress reports, final reports, journal abstracts and journal publications convey the viewpoints of the principal investigator and may not represent the views and policies of ORD and EPA. Conclusions drawn by the principal investigators have not been reviewed by the Agency.

    Project Research Results

    • Final Report
    • 2015 Progress Report
    • 2014 Progress Report
    • 2012 Progress Report
    • 2011 Progress Report
    • Original Abstract
    91 publications for this subproject
    37 journal articles for this subproject
    Main Center: R834799
    338 publications for this center
    135 journal articles for this center

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