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Residential Proximity to Major Roads, Exposure to Fine Particulate Matter, and Coronary Artery Calcium: The
Kirsten S Dorans1, Elissa H Wilker1, Wenyuan Li1
1From the Department of Epidemiology (K.S.D., E.H.W., W.L., J.S., M.A.M.), Department of Environmental Health (E.H.W., J.S., P.K.), and Department of Biostatistics (B.A.C.), Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA; Cardiovascular Epidemiology Research Unit, Department of Cardiology, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (K.S.D., E.H.W., W.L., M.B.R., P.L.L., M.A.M.), Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (M.B.R.), Cardiac MR PET CT Program, Department of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital (U.H.), and Cardiovascular Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital (C.J.O.), Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA; Unit of Environmental Epidemiology, Institute of Environmental Medicine, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden (P.L.L.); Department of Geography and Environmental Development, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel (I.K.); National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute's and Boston University's Framingham Heart Study, Framingham, MA (R.B.D., J.M.M., C.J.O.); Department of Mathematics and Statistics, Boston University, MA (R.B.D.); Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health, Boston, MA (J.M.M.); and Cardiology Section, Department of Medicine, Boston Veteran's Administration Health System, Boston, MA (C.J.O.).
Objective:
Long-term exposure to traffic and particulate matter air pollution is associated with a higher risk of cardiovascular disease, potentially via atherosclerosis promotion. Prior research on associations of traffic and particulate matter with coronary artery calcium Agatston score (CAC), an atherosclerosis correlate, has yielded inconsistent findings. Given this background, we assessed whether residential proximity to major roadway or fine particulate matter were associated with CAC in a Northeastern US study.
Approach And Results:
We measured CAC ≤2 times from 2002 to 2005 and 2008 to 2011 among Framingham Offspring or Third-Generation Cohort participants. We assessed associations of residential distance to major roadway and residential fine particulate matter (2003 average; spatiotemporal model) with detectable CAC, using generalized estimating equation regression. We used linear mixed effects models to assess associations with loge(CAC). We also assessed associations with CAC progression. Models were adjusted for demographic variables, socioeconomic position markers, and time. Among 3399 participants, 51% had CAC measured twice. CAC was detectable in 47% of observations. At first scan, mean age was 52.2 years (standard deviation 11.7); 51% male. There were no consistent associations with detectable CAC, continuous CAC, or CAC progression. We observed heterogeneous associations of distance to major roadway with odds of detectable CAC by hypertensive status; interpretation of these findings is questionable.
Conclusions:
Our findings add to prior work and support evidence against strong associations of traffic or fine particulate matter with the presence, extent, or progression of CAC in a region with relatively low levels of and little variation in fine particulate matter.