Residential proximity to main roads during pregnancy and the risk of allergic disorders in Japanese infants: The Osaka Maternal and Child Health Study

Abstract

Miyake Y, Tanaka K, Fujiwara H, Mitani Y, Ikemi H, Sasaki S, Ohya Y, Hirota Y. Residential proximity to main roads during pregnancy and the risk of allergic disorders in Japanese infants: The Osaka Maternal and Child Health Study. Pediatr Allergy Immunol 2010: 21: 22–28. © 2009 John Wiley & Sons A/S The role of traffic‐related air pollution in the initiation of allergic disorders in children is still not clearly understood. The present prospective study examined the relation between proximity of the home during pregnancy to the nearest main road, which was used as a surrogate for traffic‐related air pollutants, and the risk of allergic disorders in Japanese infants in an urban area. Subjects were 756 mother–child pairs. Distance of each subject’s home during pregnancy from the center line of all of the 235 main roads in Osaka Prefecture was computed using geographical information system software. The first survey during pregnancy and the second survey between 2 and 9 months post‐partum collected information on potential confounding factors. In the third survey, which was from 16 to 24 months post‐partum, a self‐administered questionnaire included questions on allergic disorders. In the third survey, 22.1% and 18.7% of infants became positive for wheeze and atopic eczema based on criteria of the International Study of Asthma and Allergies in Childhood (ISAAC), respectively. The risk of doctor‐diagnosed asthma and doctor‐diagnosed atopic eczema was 4.4% and 8.9%, respectively. A shorter distance of the residence during pregnancy from the nearest main road was associated with an increased risk of doctor‐diagnosed asthma and atopic eczema (adjusted odds ratios for comparison of <50 m with 200 m or more = 4.01 and 2.26, 95% confidence intervals: 1.44–11.24 and 1.08–4.59, p for trend = 0.02 and 0.03, respectively). No evident relationships were observed between the distance of the residence during pregnancy from the nearest main road and the risk of wheeze or atopic eczema based on the ISAAC criteria. It was difficult to distinguish the effect of the pre‐natal from the post‐natal exposure because most subjects lived at the same home address both before and after childbirth. Our results are likely to support the hypothesis that intrauterine exposure to traffic‐related air pollutants and/or such exposure after birth may increase the risk of more extreme manifestations of allergic disorders in infants.

Tráfego veicular como método de avaliação da exposição à poluição atmosférica nas grandes metrópoles

“…The outcomes evaluated in these studies varied between heart diseases [5][6][7][8][9] , respiratory diseases 5,[10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23] , gestational outcomes [24][25][26][27][28] , allergies and changes in the immunological system [29][30][31] , thrombosis 32 , cancer and leukemia [33][34][35][36][37] , lead contamination 38 and mortality in general 39 .…”

“…On the other hand, Miyake et al 28 found a low residential mobility in Neyagawa, Japan. A total of two interviews were conducted with the pregnant women, one in the prenatal period and the other between the 2 nd and 9 th months after birth.…”

“…Exposure was based on the distance from these points to the streets and it served as parameter to infer the level of exposure experienced by individuals. Certain studies only considered the nearest road [7][8][9]11,12,25,32 ; others used the main road (arterial roads, collector streets) considered to have high traffic intensity 6,18,20,26,28 ; yet others were based on the distance of both types of road -road or main road 5,14,17,19,31,39 . Certain authors used the shortest distance from the point of interest to a road to evaluate the exposure of individuals in their studies 6,9,25,26,32 .…”

“…Certain authors used the shortest distance from the point of interest to a road to evaluate the exposure of individuals in their studies 6,9,25,26,32 . Other authors considered individuals whose distance was lower than a certain value to be exposed, a value that ranged from 50 m 5,12,39 , 100 m 5,18,20,31,39 , 150 m 18,19,23,31 , 200 m 7,20,28,31 , 300 m 17,19 up to 400 m 11 . Some studies evaluated certain distances according to road classification: Hoek et al 5 and Finkelstein et al 39 considered individuals living as far as 100 m from a road or as far as 50 m from a main road (arterial or collector) to be exposed, whereas other authors adopted several values for distance, such as in the study conducted by Roselund et al 20 , which was based on 100 m and 200 m, and by Williams et al 31 , based on 100 m, 150 m and 200 m.…”

Exposure to outdoor air pollution during trimesters of pregnancy and childhood asthma, allergic rhinitis, and eczema

“…1.74 (95% CI: 1.15-2.62) for 15 μg/m 3 increase in NO 2 exposure in utero (Deng et al, 2015a). A prospective cohort study in Japan found that the distance between the residence and the nearest main road, a surrogate for trafficrelated pollution, during pregnancy was associated with an increased risk of doctor-diagnosed asthma (Miyake et al, 2010).…”