Environmental Health in Israel

Doctoral Fellowships

Congenital Malformations and Associations with Ambient

Air Pollution in Israel, 2000-2006

The main aim of our study was to evaluate the association between maternal exposures to air

pollution and ambient temperature during pregnancy and congenital malformations (CM) risk in

Israeli women. On the national level, ecological analyses for the total of 1,000,000 births (live births,

stillbirths, late abortions and CM) were conducted. All maternal addresses were geocoded. Socio-

demographic risk factors and non-random patterns in time and space were evaluated using Poisson

trend harmonic method, LISA and SaTScan. The analyses were conducted for 45 CM sub-groups. In

a retrospective cohort from the Tel Aviv area we analyzed the associations between CMs thought to

be related to environmental factors, mainly congenital heart defects (CHD), and maternal exposure

to ambient air pollution and ambient temperature during weeks 3-8 of pregnancy. We found that

maternal exposure to increased concentrations of PM

and ambient temperature during the winter

was associated with increased risk for multiple CHD. Results for PM

confirm results from previous

studies. Results for ambient temperature are novel.

Research publications

(1)

Agay-Shay, K., Friger, M., Linn, S., Peled, A., Amitai,Y., & Peretz, C. (2012). Periodicity and time trends in the prevalence

of total births and conceptions with congenital malformations among Jews and Muslims in Israel, 1999-2006: A time

series study of 823,966 births.

Birth Defects Research Part A: Clinical and Molecular Teratology, 94

(6), 438-448.

(2)

Agay-Shay, K., Amitai, Y., Peretz, C., Linn, S., Friger, M., & Peled, A. (2013). Exploratory spatial data analysis of

congenital malformations (CM) in Israel, 2000–2006.

ISPRS International Journal of Geo-Information, 2

(1), 237-255.

(3)

Agay-Shay, K., Friger, M., Linn, S., Peled, A., Amitai, Y., & Peretz, C. (2013). Air pollution and congenital heart

defects.

Environmental Research, 124

, 28-34.

(4)

Agay-Shay, K., Friger, M., Linn, S., Peled, A., Amitai, Y., & Peretz, C. (2013). Ambient temperature and congenital

heart defects.

Human Reproduction, 28

(8), 2289-2297.

The research focuses on the short term effects of meteorological, vehicular NO

air pollution

(VNAP) and socioeconomic (SES) factors on daily hospitalization rates of respiratory (RD) and

ischemic heart diseases (IHD) in Beer Sheva during the years 2003-2007. While the association

between meteorology and health effects has been extensively studied, findings regarding the

relationship between VNAP exposure and health outcomes are still controversial and subject to

debate. Our aim was to investigate the association between VNAP exposure, meteorological and

SES factors and daily hospitalizations for IHD and RD. Significant spatio-temporal variations of

were found within Beer Sheva. Vehicular NO

was associated with daily hospitalizations

for RD and IHD. Mean daily temperature and relative humidity were found to be associated

with acute RD in the young age group (0-14) and chronic RD and IHD in the elderly (65+).

SES was associated with daily hospitalizations by season for RD and IHD. The highest daily

hospitalizations for all seasons were found in the lowest SES level for RD and in the medium SES

level for IHD.

Fellow

Keren Agay-Shay

University of Haifa

Supervisors

Shai Linn,

Amatzia Peled and

Chava Peretz

2008-2011

Fellow

Aliza Drory

Ben-Gurion University

of the Negev

Supervisors

Dan Blumberg and

Michael Friger

2008-2011

Study of the Relationship between Spatial Dispersion of Ischemic Heart

Diseases and Respiratory Diseases and Meteorological, Vehicular Air

Pollution and Socio-Economic Factors in Israel's Negev Region