A heart condition
if you suffer from respiratory problems, be cautioned: breathing polluted air could hospitalise you with heart disease and pulmonary disorders much quicker than you believe. A recent study at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, usa, shows that risk of hospital admissions for people suffering with cardiovascular problems induced by air pollution is nearly double that for others. In fact the chances of a patient dying of heart diseases caused by air pollution shoots up if he or she is experiencing respiratory problems.
The study used records of hospital admissions during 1985 and 1994 in Cook county, Illinois, the most populous county of usa which maintains daily records of levels of particulate matter below the size of 10 micron ( pm 10 ) in the ambient air. Researchers categorised and listed people admitted each day of the given period admitted with cardiovascular diseases ( cvd ), pneumonia and chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder ( copd ) induced by air pollution. Amongst these, they made further classification of those suffering from among other respiratory diseases, like asthma and acute bronchitis. The figures were then used for statistical analysis.
The analysis showed that pre-existing cardiovascular disease, particularly conduction defects, dyrshythmias and heart failure, substantially increased risks of hospitalisation caused by pollution. It also showed that asthmatics are more susceptible to pneumonia and cardiovascular complicationsinduced by presence of pm 10 particles . In fact, people with asthma faced twice the risk of being hospitalised with pneumonia as compared to others. Researchers were also able to conclude that acute bronchitis increased susceptibility to pollution-associated admissions for cvd and copd ( Environmental Health Perspectives , Vol 108, No 9 ).
A spin-off of the extensive study and analysis was evidence emerging that pm 10 concentrations were associated with approximately 1,600 hospital admissions every year for heart diseases and 740 admissions for copd
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