Associations of night-time road traffic noise with carotid intima-media thickness and blood pressure: The Whitehall II and SABRE study cohorts
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Accepted version
Accepted version
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Road traffic noise has been linked to increased risk of stroke, for which hypertension and carotid intima-media thickness (cIMT) are risk factors. A link between traffic noise and hypertension has been established, but there are few studies on blood pressure and no studies on cIMT. OBJECTIVES: To examine cross-sectional associations for long-term exposure to night-time noise with cIMT, systolic blood pressure (SBP), diastolic blood pressure (DBP) and hypertension. METHODS: The study population consisted of 2592 adults from the Whitehall II and SABRE cohort studies living within Greater London who had cIMT, SBP and DBP measured. Exposure to night-time road traffic noise (A-weighted dB, referred to as dBA) was estimated at each participant's residential postcode centroid. RESULTS: Mean night-time road noise levels were 52dBA (SD=4). In the pooled analysis adjusted for cohort, sex, age, ethnicity, marital status, smoking, area-level deprivation and NOx there was a 9.1μm (95% CI: -7.1, 25.2) increase in cIMT in association with 10dBA increase in night-time noise. Analyses by noise categories of 55-60dBA (16.2μm, 95% CI: -8.7, 41.2), and >60dBA (21.2μm, 95% CI: -2.5, 44.9) vs. <55dBA were also positive but non-significant, expect among those not using antihypertensive medication and exposed to >60dBA vs. <55dBA (32.6μm, 95% CI: 6.2, 59.0). Associations for SBP, DPB and hypertension were close to null. CONCLUSIONS: After adjustments, including for air pollution, the association between night-time road traffic noise and cIMT was only observed among non-medication users but associations with blood pressure and hypertension were largely null.
Date Issued
2017
Date Acceptance
2016-09-27
Citation
2017, 98, pp.54-61
ISSN
1873-6750
Publisher
Elsevier
Start Page
54
End Page
61
Journal / Book Title
Environment International
Volume
98
Copyright Statement
© 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. This manuscript version is made available under the CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 license http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Identifier
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27712935
Subjects
Adult Aged *Blood Pressure *Carotid Intima-Media Thickness Cohort Studies Environmental Exposure Female Housing Humans Hypertension/*epidemiology Male Middle Aged *Motor Vehicles "*Noise, Transportation" *Cardiovascular *Cohort study *Epidemiology *Hypertension *Traffic noise "N1 - Halonen, Jaana I" "Dehbi, Hakim-Moulay" "Hansell, Anna L" "Gulliver, John" "Fecht, Daniela" "Blangiardo, Marta" "Kelly, Frank J" "Chaturvedi, Nish" "Kivimaki, Mika" "Tonne, Cathryn" eng R01 AG013196/AG/NIA NIH HHS/ RG/13/2/30098/British Heart Foundation/United Kingdom G1000758/Medical Research Council/United Kingdom R01 HL036310/HL/NHLBI NIH HHS/ MR/K013351/1/Medical Research Council/United Kingdom Department of Health/United Kingdom Netherlands Environ Int. 2017 Jan;98:54-61. doi: 10.1016/j.envint.2016.09.023. Epub 2016 Oct 3.
Publication Status
Published