title: Living close to automobile traffic and quality of life in Japan: a population-based survey.
abstract: The objective of this study was to evaluate the association between living close to traffic and health related quality of life (HRQOL) that is important to the health outcome. We administered a questionnaire including the Medical Outcome Study Short Form-36-item Health Survey to all 6197 residents living in Naie, aged 20 years and older, and received 5107 (82.4%) responses. The respondents were classified into three groups: those whose bedrooms were located to an arterial road (AR), located to other roads (OR), and not located to any road (NR). We used analysis of covariance to estimate the mean differences among the three groups for each SF-36 domain. HRQOL scores of the AR and the OR group were lower than those of the NR group in all domains. The adjusted mean scores of the AR group on "mental health" and "vitality" domains were significantly lower than those of the NR group. This study suggests that the HRQOL is an effective tool for evaluating the many impacts of road transportation on aspects of health.
authors: Epidemiology and Exposure Assessment Team, National Institute for Environmental Studies, Tsukuba, Japan. yamazaki.shin@nies.go.jp
authors: Shin
authors: S
authors: Yamazaki
authors: Shigeru
authors: S
authors: Sokejima
authors: Hiroshi
authors: H
authors: Nitta
authors: Takeo
authors: T
authors: Nakayama
authors: Shunichi
authors: S
authors: Fukuhara
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000393:Air Pollutants / Q000009:adverse effects*; D004781:Environmental Exposure; D005260:Female; D006304:Health Status; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D007564:Japan; D008297:Male; D008603:Mental Health; D008875:Middle Aged; D011788:Quality of Life; D001335:Vehicle Emissions / Q000009:adverse effects*
chemical_list: D000393:Air Pollutants; D001335:Vehicle Emissions