Personal Black Carbon Exposure Influences Ambulatory Blood Pressure: Air Pollution and Cardio-metabolic Disease (AIRCMD-China) Study

• Published in: Hypertension (Dallas, Tex. 1979) Vol. 63; no. 4; pp. 871 - 877
• Main Authors: Zhao, Xiaoyi, Sun, Zhichao, Ruan, Yanping, Yan, Jianhua, Mukherjee, Bhramar, Yang, Fumo, Duan, Fengkui, Sun, Lixian, Liang, Ruijuan, Lian, Hui, Zhang, Shuyang, Fang, Quan, Gu, Dongfeng, Brook, Jeffrey R., Sun, Qinghua, Brook, Robert D., Rajagopalan, Sanjay, Fan, Zhongjie
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 13.01.2014
• ISSN: 0194-911X; 1524-4563
• DOI: 10.1161/HYPERTENSIONAHA.113.02588

Few prospective studies have assessed the blood pressure impact of extremely high air pollution encountered in Asia’s megacities. The objective of this study was to evaluate the association between combustion-related air pollution with ambulatory blood pressure and autonomic function. During February to July 2012, personal black carbon was determined for 5 consecutive days using microaethelometers in patients with metabolic syndrome in Beijing, China. Simultaneous ambient fine particulate matter concentration was obtained from the Beijing Municipal Environmental Monitoring Center and the U.S. Embassy. 24-hour ambulatory blood pressure and heart rate variability were measured from Day 4. Arterial stiffness and endothelial function were obtained at the end of Day 5. For statistical analysis, we used generalized additive mixed models for repeated outcomes and generalized linear models for single/summary outcomes. Mean (standard deviation) of personal black carbon and fine particulate matter over 24-hour was 4.66 (2.89) and 64.2 (36.9) μg/m 3 . Exposure to high levels of black carbon in the preceding hours was significantly associated with adverse cardiovascular responses. A unit increase in personal black carbon over the previous 10 hours was associated with an increase in systolic blood pressure of 0.53 mmHg and diastolic blood pressure of 0.37 mmHg (95% confidence interval, 0.17-0.89 and 0.10-0.65 mmHg, respectively), a percent change in low frequency to high frequency ratio of 5.11 and mean inter-beat interval of −0.06 (95% confidence interval, 0.62 to 9.60 and −0.11 to −0.01, respectively). These findings highlight the public health impact of air pollution and the importance of reducing air pollution.