Community urbanization and hospitalization of adults for asthma.

* It is estimated that 150 million people worldwide are living with asthma, including 15 million people in the United States.

* Asthma involves inflammation of the airways.

* It is accompanied by increased airway hyper-responsiveness to a variety of environmental stimuli, including

--airborne allergens,

--viruses,

--tobacco smoke, and

--particulate matter.

* Risk factors for asthma include

--gender and prior diagnosis of allergies;

--communities with large populations, high household density, or both;

--proximity to heavy traffic patterns; and

--chronic exposure to nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide.

* Traffic-related air pollution accounts for much of the diminished air quality seen, especially in urban areas.

* Although emission standards are regulated by U.S. EPA, traffic volume and type are not.

* Heavy traffic patterns are a problem not only in large city centers, but also in areas of rapid suburban growth.

* Asthma research has traditionally focused on children and the elderly.

* The prevalence of asthma in the adult population (19-64 years of age) is, however, gaining recognition.

* In the past decade, there has been a surge in adult asthma and associated complications.

* Unlike childhood asthma, adult asthma affects more females than males and tends to be more difficult to treat.

* The authors hypothesized that the degree of urbanization influences the rate of asthma hospitalization among adults.

* They selected six Pennsylvania counties to test the hypothesis.

* In some counties, the study found a decrease in the adult asthma hospitalization rate as urbanization decreased.

* For other counties, however, the rate increased as urbanization decreased.

* The counties in which the latter occurred had depressed measures of socioeconomic status.

* These findings suggest that depressed socioeconomic conditions may supersede exposure to traffic-related pollution as a factor associated with asthma hospitalizations.

* Previous studies have noted a disparate prevalence of commercial trucking routes in geographical areas with low socioeconomic status.

* This phenomenon may explain why the county that ranked as least urbanized in the study had the highest adult asthma hospitalization rate.

This department, Practical Stuff! originated from you, our readers. Many of you have expressed to us that one of the main reasons you read the Journal of Environmental Health is to glean practical and useful information for your everyday work-related activities. In response to your feedback, we dedicate this section to you with salient points to remember about two to three articles in each issue.