Prenatal exposure to greenspace and cord blood lipid levels: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

BACKGROUND AND AIM: A growing body of evidence has been focused on the health benefits of exposure to greenspace; however, less is known about its health effects for the developing fetus in the prenatal period, although this period of life is the most vulnerable for environmental exposures. With the present study, we aimed to investigate for the first time the associations between maternal greenspace exposure during pregnancy and cord blood lipid levels. METHODS: This study was based on 150 pregnant women residing in Sabzevar, Iran (2018). For each participant, we characterized exposure to residential surrounding greenspace, residential proximity to green space, time spent in green spaces, and the number of plant pots at home. We measured triglycerides (TG), total cholesterol (TC), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), and TC/HDL-C and TG/HDL-C ratios in the cord blood samples to characterize the lipid levels. We developed linear regression models adjusted for relevant covariates to estimate the associations of each indicator of greenspace exposure with each cord blood lipid. RESULTS:We found higher residential surrounding greenspace across a 100m buffer, residential proximity to green space, and time spent in green spaces were associated with lower cord blood lipid levels. Our findings for the residential surrounding greenspace across 300m and 500m buffers and the number of plant pots were not conclusive. We observed some suggestions for stronger associations among parents pertaining to the lowest SES group. A potential mediatory role by air pollution was observed. CONCLUSIONS:This study suggests a beneficial association between exposure to greenspace during pregnancy and cord blood lipid levels. KEYWORDS: Prenatal exposure, newborn, natural environments