Association of Geography and Ambient Air Pollution with Urine Metal Concentrations in Six US Cities: The Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis

Yuanjie Pang, Miranda R. Jones, Maria Tellez-Plaza, Eliseo Guallar, Dhananjay Vaidya, Wendy S. Post, Joel D. Kaufman, Joseph A. Delaney and Ana Navas-Acien
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Yuanjie Pang: Departments of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA
Miranda R. Jones: Departments of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA
Maria Tellez-Plaza: Departments of Environmental Health Sciences, Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA
Eliseo Guallar: Departments of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA
Dhananjay Vaidya: Department of Medicine, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA
Wendy S. Post: Departments of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA
Joel D. Kaufman: Department of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences, School of Public Health, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
Joseph A. Delaney: Department of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
Ana Navas-Acien: Departments of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA

IJERPH, 2016, vol. 13, issue 3, 1-22

Abstract: We investigated the associations of urinary concentrations of antimony, cadmium, tungsten and uranium with geographic locations and with ambient air pollution in 304 adults in the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis from six US cities. After adjustment for sociodemographics, body mass index, and smoking status, urinary cadmium was the highest in Winston-Salem among all study sites (the geometric mean [GM] in Winston-Salem was 0.84 µg/L [95% confidence interval (CI) 0.57–1.22]). The adjusted GMs of urinary tungsten and uranium were highest in Los Angeles (0.11 µg/L [95% CI 0.08–0.16] and 0.019 µg/L [95% CI 0.016–0.023], respectively). The adjusted GM ratio comparing fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) tertiles 2 and 3 with the lowest tertile were 1.64 (95% CI 1.05–2.56) and 3.55 (95% CI 2.24–5.63) for tungsten, and 1.18 (95% CI 0.94–1.48) and 1.70 (95% CI 1.34–2.14) for uranium. The results for tungsten remained similar after adjustment for study site. Urinary cadmium, tungsten and uranium concentrations differed by geographic locations in MESA (Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis) communities. PM 2.5 levels could contribute to geographic differences in tungsten exposure. These findings highlight the need to implement preventive strategies to decrease toxic metal exposure and to evaluate the health effects of chronic exposure to those metals.

Keywords: metals; geography; air pollution; exposure modeling (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
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