[Policies for the promotion of sustainable mobility and the reduction of traffic-related air pollution in the cities participating in the EpiAir2 project].

Objective: to describe transport policies adopted in recent years (2006-2010) by some Italian municipalities and their effectiveness.

Design And Setting: survey data refer to fifteen cities participating in the EpiAir2 project: Torino, Milano, Venezia, Bologna, Firenze, Pisa, Roma, Taranto, Palermo, Cagliari, Trieste, Genova, Ancona, Napoli, and Bari.

Results: this survey revealed strengths and weaknesses of the way in which these Italian cities address the promotion of sustainable mobility.

[Air pollution and mortality in twenty-five Italian cities: results of the EpiAir2 Project].

Objectives: this study aims at presenting the results from the Italian EpiaAir2 Project on the short-term effects of air pollution on adult population (35+ years old) in 25 Italian cities.

Design: the short-term effects of air pollution on resident people died in their city were analysed adopting the time series approach. The association between increases in 10µg/m(3) in PM10, PM2.

Air pollution and respiratory infections during early childhood: an analysis of 10 European birth cohorts within the ESCAPE Project.

Background: Few studies have investigated traffic-related air pollution as a risk factor for respiratory infections during early childhood.

Objectives: We aimed to investigate the association between air pollution and pneumonia, croup, and otitis media in 10 European birth cohorts--BAMSE (Sweden), GASPII (Italy), GINIplus and LISAplus (Germany), MAAS (United Kingdom), PIAMA (the Netherlands), and four INMA cohorts (Spain)--and to derive combined effect estimates using meta-analysis.

Methods: Parent report of physician-diagnosed pneumonia, otitis media, and croup during early childhood were assessed in relation to annual average pollutant levels [nitrogen dioxide (NO2), nitrogen oxide (NOx), particulate matter≤2.

Alternative ways of expressing forced expiratory volume in the first second and long-term mortality in elderly patients with asthma.

Background: Clinical and epidemiologic evidence on asthma in the elderly is scant. There is evidence that forced expiratory volume in the first second (FEV1), a commonly used indicator of overall pulmonary function, might not be an independent predictor of 5-year mortality in elderly patients with asthma.

Objective: To investigate the association between FEV1 expressed using 3 alternative methods and 5-, 10-, and 15-year mortality in a population of elderly patients with asthma.

Air pollution from incinerators and reproductive outcomes: a multisite study.

Background: The few studies that have investigated the relationship between emissions from municipal solid-waste incinerators and adverse pregnancy outcomes have had conflicting results. We conducted a study to assess the effects of air emissions from the eight incinerators currently in operation in the Emilia-Romagna Region of Italy on reproductive outcomes (sex ratio, multiple births, preterm births, and small for gestational age [SGA] births).

Methods: We considered all births (n = 21,517) to women residing within a 4-km radius of an incinerator at the time of delivery during the period 2003-2010 who were successfully linked to the Delivery Certificate database.

Welding and lung cancer in a pooled analysis of case-control studies.

Several epidemiologic studies have indicated an increased risk of lung cancer among welders. We used the SYNERGY project database to assess welding as a risk factor for developing lung cancer. The database includes data on 15,483 male lung cancer cases and 18,388 male controls from 16 studies in Europe, Canada, China, and New Zealand conducted between 1985 and 2010.

A biomonitoring study on blood levels of beta-hexachlorocyclohexane among people living close to an industrial area.

Background: A chemical plant manufacturing pesticides has been operating since the 1950's in the Sacco River Valley (Central Italy). In 2005, high beta-hexachlorocyclohexane (Beta-HCH) concentrations were found in milk of cows raised and fed near the river. We report the results of a biomonitoring study conducted in this region to evaluate the body burden of Beta-HCH and to identify the determinants of the human contamination.

Air pollution and lung cancer incidence in 17 European cohorts: prospective analyses from the European Study of Cohorts for Air Pollution Effects (ESCAPE).

Background: Ambient air pollution is suspected to cause lung cancer. We aimed to assess the association between long-term exposure to ambient air pollution and lung cancer incidence in European populations.

Methods: This prospective analysis of data obtained by the European Study of Cohorts for Air Pollution Effects used data from 17 cohort studies based in nine European countries.

Evaluation of different strategies for identifying asymptomatic left ventricular dysfunction and pre-clinical (stage B) heart failure in the elderly. Results from 'PREDICTOR', a population based-study in central Italy.

Aims: To evaluate the accuracy and cost-effectiveness of different screening strategies to identify systolic and/or diastolic asymptomatic LV dysfunction (ALVD), as well as pre-clinical (stage B) heart failure (HF), in a community of elderly subjects in Italy.

Methods And Results: A sample of 1452 subjects aged 65-84 years were chosen from the original cohort of 2001 randomly selected residents of the Lazio Region (Italy), as a part of the PREDICTOR survey. All subjects underwent physical examination, biochemistry/NT-proBNP assessment, 12-lead ECG, and Doppler transthoracic echocardiography (TE).

Short-term associations between fine and coarse particulate matter and hospitalizations in Southern Europe: results from the MED-PARTICLES project.

Background: Evidence on the short-term effects of fine and coarse particles on morbidity in Europe is scarce and inconsistent.

Objectives: We aimed to estimate the association between daily concentrations of fine and coarse particles with hospitalizations for cardiovascular and respiratory conditions in eight Southern European cities, within the MED-PARTICLES project.

Methods: City-specific Poisson models were fitted to estimate associations of daily concentrations of particulate matter with aerodynamic diameter ≤ 2.

Associations between fine and coarse particles and mortality in Mediterranean cities: results from the MED-PARTICLES project.

Background: Few studies have investigated the independent health effects of different size fractions of particulate matter (PM) in multiple locations, especially in Europe.

Objectives: We estimated the short-term effects of PM with aerodynamic diameter ≤ 10 μm (PM10), ≤ 2.5 μm (PM2.

[Epidemiologic surveillance of mesothelioma for the prevention of asbestos exposure also in non-traditional settings].

Objective: To show how malignant mesothelioma (MM) surveillance not only identifies settings of exposure representing past industrial history, but it may also detect conditions of current exposure relevant for the prevention, if the wide spectrum of asbestos uses is considered.

Design: Active search of MM cases and exposure assessment at individual level through a questionnaire; identification of exposure circumstances relevant for prevention.

Setting And Participants: Italy, all the Regions where a Regional Operating Centre (COR) is established to identify all MM cases diagnosed in the population and analyze their occupational, residential, household and environmental histories.

Human biomonitoring for Cd, Hg and Pb in blood of inhabitants of the Sacco Valley (Italy).

Introduction: The Sacco Valley (Lazio, Italy) is characterized by high density population and several industrial chemical productions that during the time had led to a substantial amount of by-products. The result was a severe environmental pollution of the area and in particular of the river Sacco. In 1991, the analysis of water and soils samples of three industrial landfills revealed the presence of organochlorine compounds and heavy metals.

Evaluation of land use regression models for NO2 and particulate matter in 20 European study areas: the ESCAPE project.

Land use regression models (LUR) frequently use leave-one-out-cross-validation (LOOCV) to assess model fit, but recent studies suggested that this may overestimate predictive ability in independent data sets. Our aim was to evaluate LUR models for nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and particulate matter (PM) components exploiting the high correlation between concentrations of PM metrics and NO2. LUR models have been developed for NO2, PM2.

Chronic burden of near-roadway traffic pollution in 10 European cities (APHEKOM network).

Recent epidemiological research suggests that near road traffic-related pollution may cause chronic disease, as well as exacerbation of related pathologies, implying that the entire "chronic disease progression" should be attributed to air pollution, no matter what the proximate cause was. We estimated the burden of childhood asthma attributable to air pollution in 10 European cities by calculating the number of cases of 1) asthma caused by near road traffic-related pollution, and 2) acute asthma events related to urban air pollution levels. We then expanded our approach to include coronary heart diseases in adults.

Saharan dust and the association between particulate matter and daily hospitalisations in Rome, Italy.

Introduction: Outbreaks of Saharan dust have been shown to exacerbate the effect of particulate matter (PM) on mortality. Their role on PM-morbidity association is less clear. This study aims to evaluate the effect of Saharan dust on the PM-hospitalisations association in Rome, Italy.

Exposure to benzene and childhood leukaemia: a pilot case-control study.

Objectives: Main purpose To evaluate the feasibility of a measurement-based assessment of benzene exposure in case-control studies of paediatric cancer; Additional aims To identify the sources of exposure variability; to assess the performance of two benzene biomarkers; to verify the occurrence of participation bias; to check whether exposures to benzene and to 50 Hz magnetic fields were correlated, and might exert reciprocal confounding effects.

Design: Pilot case-control study of childhood leukaemia and exposure to benzene assessed by repeated seasonal weekly measurements in breathing zone air samples and outside the children's dwellings, with concurrent determinations of cotinine, t-t-muconic acid (MA) and sulfo-phenylmercapturic acid (S-PMA) in urine.

Participants: 108 cases and 194 controls were eligible for inclusion.

Air pollution and multiple acute respiratory outcomes.

Short-term effects of air pollutants on respiratory mortality and morbidity have been consistently reported but usually studied separately. To more completely assess air pollution effects, we studied hospitalisations for respiratory diseases together with out-of-hospital respiratory deaths. A time-stratified case-crossover study was carried out in six Italian cities from 2001 to 2005.

Long-term exposure to urban air pollution and mortality in a cohort of more than a million adults in Rome.

Background: Few European studies have investigated the effects of long-term exposure to both fine particulate matter (≤ 2.5 µm; PM2.5) and nitrogen dioxide (NO2) on mortality.

Walking four times weekly for at least 15 min is associated with longevity in a cohort of very elderly people.

Objectives: This study investigated the role of walking outdoors on longevity, controlling for individual and other life-style factors as possible confounders.

Methods: A 10-year cohort study was conducted with 152 self-caring and mobile, mean age 80 years, were enrolled in the study. Information on socio-demographic characteristics, clinical and biochemical data, diet, physical activity, smoking, depression status, cognitive status and anthropometrics measurements, were obtained for all participants.