(Press-News.org) London, UK - 29 Aug 2015: Pollution and weather influence outcomes after a heart attack, according to research presented at ESC Congress today by Ms Aneta Cislak, research fellow in the Silesian Centre for Heart Diseases, Medical University of Silesia in Zabrze, Poland.1
"Weather changes like rain or heat affect our daily activity and even our productivity at work," said Ms Cislak. "Since this influence is so noticeable we were interested to see if weather has any connection with cardiovascular diseases including acute coronary syndromes. Moreover, air pollution affects our health, especially in highly industrialised areas. We performed our research in Silesia, the most urbanised and industrialised region in Poland."
The study examined the relationship between environmental factors and severity of clinical status and short-term prognosis in patients with non ST-segment elevation acute coronary syndromes (NSTE ACS). These include NSTE myocardial infarction (NSTEMI) (heart attack) and unstable angina.
The study enrolled 2 388 patients admitted for NSTE ACS between 2006 and 2012. Data on meteorological conditions and air pollutants was obtained from the Silesian Air Monitoring Website. Weather factors included atmospheric pressure, air temperature, wind speed, humidity and total solar radiation intensity measured on the day of admission. Air concentrations of the most common pollutants (sulphur dioxide, nitric oxides, carbon monoxide, ozone and particulate matters) were recorded.
Weather and pollution parameters were correlated with clinical status expressed by left ventricular ejection fraction, a measurement of how well the heart pumps with each beat;2 MI rates; GRACE risk score, which assesses future risk of death or MI;3 and CRUSADE Bleeding Score, which assesses bleeding risk.4
The researchers found that patients with high risks of MI and bleeding and low left ventricular ejection fraction were admitted for NSTE ACS on warmer, sunnier, drier and windy days with higher carbon monoxide and ozone air concentrations (Figure 1). Ms Cislak said: "These were the sickest patients. The findings may be explained by the fact that their organs may be more sensitive to weather changes, leading to decompensation."
Treatment with percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) to widen blocked coronary arteries was more frequently successful when the weather was sunnier and less windy but colder and with lower concentrations of ozone, carbon monoxide and nitric oxides (Figure 2). "One of the possible explanations for this finding is that air pollutants like carbon monoxide bind irreversibly to haemoglobin and impair blood oxygen transport. This can cause hypoxia and lead to worse clinical status and less successful treatment," said Ms Cislak.
Higher in-hospital and one month mortality was observed on colder, more sunny and less windy days (Figure 3). "For now, we are not able to explain this phenomenon, but we hope that further studies will help us to verify and understand it better," said Ms Cislak.
She added: "This was a small observational study and our analysis was univariate so we cannot rule out the possibility that the associations were caused by the co-existence of other factors. Multivariate analysis is needed to confirm our observations. Possible mechanisms for our observations are various. They may include seasonal growth of death rates reported in the general population in Poland. Also the negative influence of air pollutants on the cardiovascular system could be explained by their connection with inflammation, affecting the respiratory system and as an effect impaired oxygenation. There is no doubt that the analysed factors may potentiate or diminish each other's effects e.g wind purifies the air by blowing pollutants or lower temperature causes more intensive home heating and combustion products emission."
Ms Cislak concluded: "It should be remembered that not only do humans influence the environment, but the environment also influences humans. Our study suggests that environmental factors may affect the severity of clinical status and short-term prognosis in patients with NSTE ACS. We are now investigating the impact of meteorology and air pollution on 600 000 patients in the Silesian Cardiovascular Database who were hospitalised with cardiovascular diseases in the last ten years in Silesia."
INFORMATION:
Figure 1: Relationship between clinical status, meteorological factors and air pollutants
Figure 2: Relationship between PCI treatment success, meteorological factors and air pollutants
Figure 3: Relationship between mortality, meteorological factors and air pollutants
London, UK - 29 Aug 2015: Refractory cardiac arrest patients brought to hospital with ongoing cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) can survive with good brain function, according to research in nearly 4 000 patients presented at ESC Congress today by Dr Helle Søholm, a cardiologist at Copenhagen University Hospital Righospitalet in Denmark.1
"The faster a patient with cardiac arrest is resuscitated and brought back to life the better," said Dr Søholm. "The prognosis for patients with refractory cardiac arrest with long resuscitation attempts has previously been ...
London, UK - 29 Aug 2015: For the first time, ESC Guidelines published today give the highest degree of recommendation for the radial approach over the femoral one for coronary angiography and percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) in patients with acute coronary syndromes (ACS). The ACS without persistent ST-segment elevation (NSTE-ACS) guidelines, drafted by an international multidisciplinary Task Force, are published online in European Heart Journal1 and on the ESC Website.2
"New data shows that the radial approach is superior to the femoral not only in terms of ...
London, UK - 29 Aug 2015: ESC Guidelines published today on infective endocarditis boost the role of imaging in diagnosis of this deadly disease.
"We emphasise the need for a multimodality imaging approach to diagnosing endocarditis," said Professor Gilbert Habib, Chairperson of the guidelines Task Force. "While the 2009 guidelines1 focused on echocardiography, the 2015 guidelines show the important role of other imaging techniques such as PET-CT. These new imaging techniques are increasingly useful for the diagnosis and management of infective endocarditis and we recommend ...
London, UK - 29 Aug 2015: New ESC Guidelines on pericardial diseases are published today. Until now there was insufficient evidence for strong recommendations in this group of conditions which can severely restrict quality of life.
"Pericardial diseases include different clinical presentations and various aetiologies that require appropriate management," said Professor Yehuda Adler, Co-Chairperson of the guidelines Task Force. "We hope these new recommendations will help clinicians to manage these diseases with resulting improvements in outcomes and quality of life."
The ...
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The 2015 ESC/ERS Guidelines for the diagnosis and treatment of pulmonary hypertension are ...
London, UK - 29 Aug 2015: ESC Guidelines published today recommend DNA analysis as a fundamental component of post mortem assessment in young sudden death victims. Identification of a genetic cause helps to quickly diagnose and protect relatives.
The Guidelines are published online in European Heart Journal1 and on the ESC Website2 and are the European update to the 2006 European/American guidelines.3 They focus on preventing sudden cardiac death in patients with ventricular arrhythmias.
"For the first time these guidelines have incorporated the concept proposed by ...
Are some people immune to hangovers, and can eating or drinking water after heavy drinking prevent a hangover? The answers appear to be 'no' and 'no' according to new research presented the ECNP conference in Amsterdam.
Excessive alcohol consumption has familiar consequences, many of them quite damaging. If a person does not experience a hangover - and 25% to 30% of drinkers regularly claim this - they may be more likely to continue drinking, so good research into the outcomes of drinking to excess is needed.
A group of international researchers from the Netherlands ...
Tropical Storm Erika was centered in the Eastern Caribbean Sea and affecting Puerto Rico and Hispaniola when NASA's Terra satellite passed overhead mid-day on Friday, August 28, 2015. Two hours after Terra passed, NOAA's GOES-East satellite saw Erika's western side over the Dominican Republic.
At 15:05 UTC (11:05 a.m. EDT) the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer instrument aboard NASA's Terra satellite captured a visible light image Tropical Storm Erika approaching Hispaniola. Erika's center was in the eastern Caribbean Sea, and the northern quadrant of the ...
To understand how confidence in parenting may predict parenting behaviors in women who were abused as children, psychologists at the University of Rochester have found that mothers who experienced more types of maltreatment as children are more critical of their ability to parent successfully. Intervention programs for moms at-risk, therefore, should focus on bolstering mothers' self-confidence--not just teach parenting skills, the researchers said.
"We know that maltreated children can have really low self-esteem," said Louisa Michl, a doctoral student in the department ...
A simple change in the wording of a traffic sign - from "Share the Road" to "Bicycles May Use Full Lane" - could help clarify the rules of the road for bicyclists and motorists, according to a North Carolina State University study.
"'Share the Road' signs are common but what that means in terms of how drivers and bicycle riders should interact can be ambiguous," says George Hess, natural resources professor and co-author of the study in PLOS One. Some bicyclists complain that motorists consider them to be in the way, while some motorists accuse bicyclists of hogging ...
