Air pollution puts women with diabetes at higher heart risk

Air pollution is a definite danger to one’s health, and has been shown to increase the risk of cardiovascular disease and stroke, but diabetic women are significantly more prone to these illnesses, a new study indicated.

Harvard University researchers looked at the health histories of 100,000 women.

According to the team, an increase of 10 micrograms per cubic meter of air pollution in PM2.5, PM2.5-10 and PM 10 will raise a woman’s risk of cardiovascular disease by 44 percent, 17 percent and 19 percent, respectively, if she had type 2 diabetes.

While all women had small increases in risk of cardiovascular events with more air pollution exposure, the increased risk was statistically significant for all cardiovascular outcomes measured and across all sizes of particulate matter among women with diabetes. Heart disease risk was up a bit for all women with more exposure to small pollution particles from engines, roads, and power plants. As it is the leading environmental health risk, air pollution and particulate matter is also a critical topic for scientific studies if the global number of premature deaths are to decrease.

The impact of exposures to very fine, larger, and both fine and larger inhalable particulate matter were assessed in the study.

“Given the vast literature on the adverse health effects of air pollution, I do believe that people should be concerned about air pollution exposures”, Hart said. There were 6,767 cases of heart diseases between 1989 and 2006 with 3,295 strokes and 3,878 coronary heart diseases in the group studied. Against this background, it is necessary that groups most at risk are timely identified.

Diabetes is an inflammatory disease, and air particles may cause further inflammation, putting more stress on the cardiovascular system, said Dr. Bart Ostro of the Air Pollution Epidemiology Section of the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, who was not part of the new study.

“In multivariable models, increases in all size fractions of PM were associated with small, but not statistically significant, increased risks of total CVD, coronary heart disease, and stroke”.

This risk was greater for women with diabetes. Although it might be overwhelming for people living closer to power plants or major roadways to avoid air pollution, it does help to know that diabetic women are at a higher risk of getting heart diseases on account of these pollutants.

While these results can not be ruled out for men, researchers say that hormonal function is considered as an important determinant in the ratio. The NHS study followed up with women every two years so they could update risk factor and disease status, with a consistent response rate of 90 percent. The team reports its findings in a paper published November 25 in the Journal of the American Heart Association Report.