The air quality along the Wasatch Front has long been considered poor, especially during the winter when inversions trap polluted air in the valleys, but researchers are still learning exactly how our health is affected by poor air quality.
Neurosurgeon Robert Rennert, MD, led research efforts for a retrospective study of 70 patients seen at the University of Utah for aSAH. In the course of the study, Rennert and his team reviewed nearly 13,000 data points to determine PM2.5 levels in the days, weeks, and months leading up to the admissions of local patients treated for aSAH at the University of Utah Hospital over five years. The goal was to determine whether PM2.5 levels affected each patient’s risk of hemorrhage.
“After controlling for other variables, we expected to find that patients were more likely to be admitted for aSAH within a week of exposure to high PM2.5 levels,” Rennert says. “Instead, we found that these patients were experiencing higher rates of aneurysmal rupture 3-6 months after peaks in air pollution levels.”