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. 2020 Jan 30;9(2):376.
doi: 10.3390/jcm9020376.

Saharan Dust Events in the Dust Belt -Canary Islands- and the Observed Association with in-Hospital Mortality of Patients with Heart Failure

Alberto Dominguez-Rodriguez  1   2   3 , Néstor Baez-Ferrer  1 , Sergio Rodríguez  4   5 , Pablo Avanzas  6   7   8 , Pedro Abreu-Gonzalez  9 , Enric Terradellas  10 , Emilio Cuevas  11 , Sara Basart  12 , Ernest Werner  9
Affiliations

Saharan Dust Events in the Dust Belt -Canary Islands- and the Observed Association with in-Hospital Mortality of Patients with Heart Failure

Alberto Dominguez-Rodriguez et al. J Clin Med. .

Abstract

Recent studies have found increases in the cardiovascular mortality rates during poor air quality events due to outbreaks of desert dust. In Tenerife, we collected (2014-2017) data in 829 patients admitted with a heart failure diagnosis in the Emergency Department of the University Hospital of the Canaries. In this region, concentrations of PM10 and PM2.5 are usually low (~20 and 10 µg/m3), but they increase to 360 and 115 μg/m3, respectively, during Saharan dust events. By using statistical tools (including multivariable logistic regressions), we compared in-hospital mortality of patients with heart failure and exposure to PM10 and PM2.5 during dust and no-dust events. We found that 86% of in-hospital heart failure mortality cases occurred during Saharan dust episodes that resulted in PM10 > 50 µg/m3 (interquartile range: 71-96 µg/m3). A multivariate analysis showed that, after adjusting for other covariates, exposure to Saharan dust events associated with PM10 > 50 µg/m3 was an independent predictor of heart failure in-hospital mortality (OR = 2.79, 95% CI (1.066-7.332), p = 0.03). In conclusion, this study demonstrates that exposure to high Saharan dust concentrations is independently associated with in-hospital mortality in patients with heart failure.

Keywords: Saharan dust; dust belt; heart failure; in-hospital mortality.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest. The funders had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript, or in the decision to publish the results.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Global Dust Optical Depth highlighting the location of Tenerife and of the Dust Belt (WHO, 2017).
Figure 2
Figure 2
Time series of daily mean values of (A) PM10 measured at three sites of Tenerife (South, S-TF; Northeast, NE-TF; and North, N-TF) and of (B) surface dust concentrations provided by the World Meteorological Organization’s Sand and Dust Storm Warning Advisory and Assessment System (WMO SDSWAS). Example of a typical dust event of winter (26-Dec-2016): surface dust concentrations (C1) and vertical dust profile in Tenerife (C2). Example of a typical dust event of summer (08-Aug-2017): dust optical depth (D1) and vertical dust profile in Tenerife (D2). Blue circle highlights the location of Tenerife.
Figure 3
Figure 3
(A) Picture of a PM10 sample collected from the ambient air (at the rate of 30 m3/h during 8 h) during a Saharan dust event. The samples were collected in a filter, and the ochre colour of the samples evidenced the desert dust nature; the outer white layer is the blank part of the filter (no sample). (B–D) Mean bulk composition of PMx in Tenerife during Saharan dust events according to García et al. [30], highlighting the contributions of desert dust, organic matter (OM), ammonium (NH4+), nitrate (NO3−), sulphate (SO4=) and the undetermined fraction (und). The und fraction is mostly water attached to the aerosols.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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