Personal Air Pollution Interventions

Dr. Kevin Cromar organized and co-chaired with Dr. Robert Laumbach (Rutgers University) an American Thoracic Society (ATS) funded workshop, "Personal Interventions to Reduce Exposures and Health Risks of Outdoor Air Pollution," on May 19, 2018 in San Diego, California.  The all-day workshop included 18 international experts that presented and discussed: susceptible sub-populations that may benefit from personal interventions; evaluation of air quality indices and other risk communication tools for outdoor air pollution; trade-offs of behavior modification decisions regarding exercise and mode of transportation; state of the science evaluations of home filtration equipment and personal respirators; environmental justice issues surrounding personal interventions; and issues involving communication between clinicians and patients. The intellectual foundation of the workshop benefited greatly by having access not only to extensive published research but also having access to multiple yet to be published studies and reports by scientific researchers in academia, at the World Health Organization, and at US EPA.  Drs. Laumbach and Cromar will continue to work with the World Health Organization as part of a series of expert meetings in Fall 2019 to make recommendations for action and research, ultimately culminating in clinical practice guidelines made in conjunction with other professional medical associations.

Tile photo by David deLeon.