The polluted air that we inhale can affect our brain, and lead to cognitive impairment; a new study carried out at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Boston University School of Medicine found that our brain could decrease in size, and that people who are most exposed are more likely to suffer from strokes or dementia.
Study lead author, Elissa H. Wilker, Sc.D. who is a researcher at the Cardiovascular Epidemiology Research Unit at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in Boston, believed that middle-aged to older people are the most affected.
The research was conducted on a population sample of 943 people who were at least 60 years old. On the first review, they were found to be perfectly healthy; none of them suffered from dementia or had a stroke in the past. They lived in New York, Boston and New England, areas, where pollution is not significant. An MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) was used to analyze the brain functions and structures of all the participants to the study. The images were examined in relation to the pollution levels from the area where the people were living.
The findings were quite surprising: according to the researchers, brain volume was smaller by 0.32% for every increase of less than 2.5 micrograms of fine-particle pollution per cubic meter.
This pollution usually comes from a wide variety of sources, with car exhaust one of the major culprits in urban cities.
Dr. Sudha Seshadri, Professor of Neurology, a representative of the Boston University School of Medicine, stated that people who live in highly polluted areas are likely to have a brain volume smaller than other people who are the same age, thus pointing to the devastating effects air contamination has.
The scans also revealed that pollution could result in a 46% increase in the probability of a person having a silent stroke. When someone has a silent stroke, he/she is generally unaware of it, as they are asymptomatic. However, these can lead to more severe strokes in the future. Silent strokes are a real danger, even if they are not as severe as a normal stroke and sufferers might not even feel any discomfort. An MRI scan is still able to detect them, however.
Fine-particle pollution may be more damaging for the brain than other types of contamination, leading to the brain atrophy that has been widely blamed on aging. The results of the study were published in “Stroke”, the American Heart Association journal and are consistent with other studies in the field.
Source: Wall Street OTC
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