A study protocol to evaluate the relationship between outdoor air pollution and pregnancy outcomes.
BACKGROUND
The present study protocol is designed to assess the relationship between outdoor air pollution and low birth weight and preterm births outcomes performing a semi-ecological analysis. Semi-ecological design studies are widely used to assess effects of air pollution in humans. In this type of analysis, health outcomes and covariates are measured in individuals and exposure assignments are usually based on air quality monitor stations. Therefore, estimating individual exposures are one of the major challenges when investigating these relationships with a semi-ecologic design.


METHODS
Semi-ecologic study consisting of a retrospective cohort study with ecologic assignment of exposure is applied. Health outcomes and covariates are collected at Primary Health Care Center. Data from pregnant registry, clinical record and specific questionnaire administered orally to the mothers of children born in period 2007-2010 in Portuguese Alentejo Litoral region, are collected by the research team. Outdoor air pollution data are collected with a lichen diversity biomonitoring program, and individual pregnancy exposures are assessed with spatial geostatistical simulation, which provides the basis for uncertainty analysis of individual exposures. Awareness of outdoor air pollution uncertainty will improve validity of individual exposures assignments for further statistical analysis with multivariate regression models.


CONCLUSIONS
Exposure misclassification is an issue of concern in semi-ecological design. In this study, personal exposures are assigned to each pregnant using geocoded addresses data. A stochastic simulation method is applied to lichen diversity values index measured at biomonitoring survey locations, in order to assess spatial uncertainty of lichen diversity value index at each geocoded address. These methods assume a model for spatial autocorrelation of exposure and provide a distribution of exposures in each study location. We believe that variability of simulated exposure values at geocoded addresses will improve knowledge on variability of exposures, improving therefore validity of individual exposures to input in posterior statistical analysis.
Centro de Recursos Naturais e Ambiente, Instituto Superior Técnico, Universidade Técnica de Lisboa, Lisboa, Portugal. manuel.ribeiro@ist.utl.pt
Manuel C
MC
Ribeiro
Maria J
MJ
Pereira
Amílcar
A
Soares
Cristina
C
Branquinho
Sofia
S
Augusto
Esteve
E
Llop
Susana
S
Fonseca
Joaquim G
JG
Nave
António B
AB
Tavares
Carlos M
CM
Dias
Ana
A
Silva
Ismael
I
Selemane
Joaquin
J
de Toro
Mário J
MJ
Santos
Fernanda
F
Santos
D000393:Air Pollutants / Q000009:adverse effects* / Q000032:analysis; D015331:Cohort Studies; D004784:Environmental Monitoring / Q000379:methods; D005260:Female; D040362:Geographic Information Systems; D006801:Humans; D008485:Medical Audit; D011174:Portugal; D011247:Pregnancy; D011256:Pregnancy Outcome; D012107:Research Design; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D035501:Uncertainty
D000393:Air Pollutants