Exposure to animals and the risk of allergic asthma: a population-based cross-sectional study in Finnish and Russian children

BACKGROUND: There is little information on potential differences in animal exposure between Finland and Russia and particularly on the effects of animal exposure on asthma among Russian children. The aim of the study was to compare the pet and farm animal exposures and to assess the relations of pre...

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Autores principales: Hugg, Timo T, Jaakkola, Maritta S, Ruotsalainen, Risto, Pushkarev, Vadim, Jaakkola, Jouni JK
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2008
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2430194/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18538018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1476-069X-7-28
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author Hugg, Timo T
Jaakkola, Maritta S
Ruotsalainen, Risto
Pushkarev, Vadim
Jaakkola, Jouni JK
author_facet Hugg, Timo T
Jaakkola, Maritta S
Ruotsalainen, Risto
Pushkarev, Vadim
Jaakkola, Jouni JK
author_sort Hugg, Timo T
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: There is little information on potential differences in animal exposure between Finland and Russia and particularly on the effects of animal exposure on asthma among Russian children. The aim of the study was to compare the pet and farm animal exposures and to assess the relations of pre- and postnatal animal exposures to the occurrence of allergic asthma in Finnish and Russian school children. METHODS: We conducted a population-based cross-sectional study in neighbour towns on either side of the Finnish-Russian border; Imatra in Finland and Svetogorsk in Russia. The study population consisted of 512 Finnish and 581 Russian school children aged 7–16 years (response rate 79%). Multivariate logistic regression analysis was used to estimate adjusted odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) related to each exposure. RESULTS: Current indoor exposure to pets was more frequent among school children in Svetogorsk than in Imatra (67.5% vs. 56.0%, P < 0.001). Finnish children were exposed more frequently to dogs, whereas Russian children to cats during childhood and to farm animals during pregnancy and infancy. The risk of self-reported allergic asthma was inversely related to indoor dog keeping ever in Finland (adjusted OR 0.35, 95% CI 0.13, 0.95), whereas in Russia the risk of allergic asthma was increased in relation to combined indoor cat exposure during infancy and currently (4.56, 1.10, 18.91). The risk of asthma was elevated in relation to contact to farm animals during pregnancy (Finland: 1.95, 0.69, 5.50; Russia: 1.90, 0.70, 5.17) and early life (Finland: 2.05, 0.78, 5.40; Russia: 1.21, 0.39, 3.73). CONCLUSION: Exposure to pets and farm animals during childhood differed significantly between Finland and Russia. Our study provides evidence that early-life exposure to cats increases the risk of asthma whereas exposure to dogs is protective. Our findings suggest that intermittent fetal and early-life exposure to farm animals increases the risk of allergic asthma in urban children visiting farms.
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spelling pubmed-24301942008-06-17 Exposure to animals and the risk of allergic asthma: a population-based cross-sectional study in Finnish and Russian children Hugg, Timo T Jaakkola, Maritta S Ruotsalainen, Risto Pushkarev, Vadim Jaakkola, Jouni JK Environ Health Research BACKGROUND: There is little information on potential differences in animal exposure between Finland and Russia and particularly on the effects of animal exposure on asthma among Russian children. The aim of the study was to compare the pet and farm animal exposures and to assess the relations of pre- and postnatal animal exposures to the occurrence of allergic asthma in Finnish and Russian school children. METHODS: We conducted a population-based cross-sectional study in neighbour towns on either side of the Finnish-Russian border; Imatra in Finland and Svetogorsk in Russia. The study population consisted of 512 Finnish and 581 Russian school children aged 7–16 years (response rate 79%). Multivariate logistic regression analysis was used to estimate adjusted odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) related to each exposure. RESULTS: Current indoor exposure to pets was more frequent among school children in Svetogorsk than in Imatra (67.5% vs. 56.0%, P < 0.001). Finnish children were exposed more frequently to dogs, whereas Russian children to cats during childhood and to farm animals during pregnancy and infancy. The risk of self-reported allergic asthma was inversely related to indoor dog keeping ever in Finland (adjusted OR 0.35, 95% CI 0.13, 0.95), whereas in Russia the risk of allergic asthma was increased in relation to combined indoor cat exposure during infancy and currently (4.56, 1.10, 18.91). The risk of asthma was elevated in relation to contact to farm animals during pregnancy (Finland: 1.95, 0.69, 5.50; Russia: 1.90, 0.70, 5.17) and early life (Finland: 2.05, 0.78, 5.40; Russia: 1.21, 0.39, 3.73). CONCLUSION: Exposure to pets and farm animals during childhood differed significantly between Finland and Russia. Our study provides evidence that early-life exposure to cats increases the risk of asthma whereas exposure to dogs is protective. Our findings suggest that intermittent fetal and early-life exposure to farm animals increases the risk of allergic asthma in urban children visiting farms. BioMed Central 2008-06-06 /pmc/articles/PMC2430194/ /pubmed/18538018 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1476-069X-7-28 Text en Copyright © 2008 Hugg et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License ( (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0) ), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research
Hugg, Timo T
Jaakkola, Maritta S
Ruotsalainen, Risto
Pushkarev, Vadim
Jaakkola, Jouni JK
Exposure to animals and the risk of allergic asthma: a population-based cross-sectional study in Finnish and Russian children
title Exposure to animals and the risk of allergic asthma: a population-based cross-sectional study in Finnish and Russian children
title_full Exposure to animals and the risk of allergic asthma: a population-based cross-sectional study in Finnish and Russian children
title_fullStr Exposure to animals and the risk of allergic asthma: a population-based cross-sectional study in Finnish and Russian children
title_full_unstemmed Exposure to animals and the risk of allergic asthma: a population-based cross-sectional study in Finnish and Russian children
title_short Exposure to animals and the risk of allergic asthma: a population-based cross-sectional study in Finnish and Russian children
title_sort exposure to animals and the risk of allergic asthma: a population-based cross-sectional study in finnish and russian children
topic Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2430194/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18538018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1476-069X-7-28
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