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ACUTE EFFECTS OF AIR POLLUTION ON RESPIRATORY SYMPTOMS AND PEAK FLOW MEASUREMENTS OF SYMPTOMATIC AND ASYMPTOMATIC CHILDREN IN NIZHNI TAGIL, RUSSIA
Citation:
Ozkaynak, A H., J. Xue, J. D. Spengler, H. Parise, L. Privalova, S. Brezgina, B. Katsnelson, S. Kuzmin, S. Voronin, AND A. Kosheleva. ACUTE EFFECTS OF AIR POLLUTION ON RESPIRATORY SYMPTOMS AND PEAK FLOW MEASUREMENTS OF SYMPTOMATIC AND ASYMPTOMATIC CHILDREN IN NIZHNI TAGIL, RUSSIA. Presented at PM 2000 Program Committee Meeting, Salt Lake City, UT, October 3-4, 1999.
Description:
A panel study with 85 elementary school children of 9 to 11 years old was carried out during March 16 - May 16, 1998 in Nizhni Tagil, Russia. All of the children were recruited from a single school and their respiratory health status was characterized through questionnaires and by a local pediatric asthma and broncho-obstructive symptoms (BOS) specialist. Forty-two (42) children were diagnosed as having one of the BOS conditions: symptoms or diagnoses of bronchial obstruction or asthma, or severe chest cold lasting over 10 days in the past year. Daily respiratory symptom diaries and twice-daily peak flow measurements were obtained froze each child. Concurrent daily PM10, PM2.5, SO2 and NO2 measurements were collected at the school studied. Harvard impactors were used to measure PM. NO2 and SO2 were measured using passive Yanagisawa and Ogawa badges, respectively. Analysis of the association between changes in the daily air pollution levels and the upper (URS) or lower (LRS) respiratory symptoms was performed using generalized estimating equations (GEE) procedures with SAS software. All of the GEE logistic regression model specifications controlled for age, gender, temperature, humidity, time trend, fever and BOS status. The results showed statistically significant associations between PM10 or PM2.5 in the preceding day and increased incidence of URS in the following day (about 6% increase associated with an inter-quartile range pollution value of 6 ug/m3 PM2.5 or 9 ug/m3 PM10. Statistically significant associations were also detected among PM10, PM2.5, NO2, SO2 and LRS; however, these results were less robust and depended on the particular time lags selected for the temperature and the relative humidity variables.
The analysis of the fluctuations in the morning or evening PEF measurements failed to show any statistically significant associations between these lung function measures and short-term changes in any of the pollution measures collected.
This abstract has been reviewed in accordance with the U. S. Environmental Protection Agency's peer and administrative review policies and approved for presentation and publication. Mention of trade names or commercial products does not constitute endorsement or recommendation for use.