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Air pollution and telomere length: a systematic review of 12,058 subjects
Methods: Two reviewers independently searched on electronic databases including PUBMED, EMBASE, SCOPUS, WEB OF SCIENCE and Ovid. The key terms were “air pollution” and “telomere” without language restriction. Articles relating to tobacco smoke were excluded.
Results: A total of 12,058 subjects from 25 articles remained for final review. All were observational studies: 14 cross-sectional, 6 cohort and 5 case-control studies. Nineteen (76%) assessed leukocyte telomere length (LTL) of which 15 found associations between air pollution and shorter TL, 2 with longer TL, 1 had mixed results, and a study of patients with type 2 diabetes found non-significant associations with TL. One found longer TL from saliva. The remaining studies were of placental cells, buccal cells or sperm and all reported shorter TL associated with air pollution. Particulate matter (PM) was investigated in 8 articles, and the remainder assessed black carbon (BC), benzene, lead, cadmium and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH). Geographically, 11 studies were conducted in Europe, with 10 in Asia and 4 in North America. While all followed Cawthon’s protocol for TL assessment, discordance in the reporting formats did not allow us to perform a quantitative meta-analysis.
Conclusions: Most of the studies support the association of shorter TL with air pollution. Uniform reporting format would be warranted for future studies to estimate true effect size of air pollution on TL.
History
Publication title
Cardiovascular Diagnosis and TherapyVolume
8Issue
4Pagination
480-492ISSN
2223-3652Department/School
Menzies Institute for Medical ResearchPublisher
AME Publishing CompanyPlace of publication
Hong Kong, ChinaRights statement
Copyright 2018 Cardiovascular Diagnosis and TherapyRepository Status
- Restricted