Exercise in urban polluted environments and childhood asthma -- Stephanie Lovinsky-Desir, MD

The Foundation's Harold Amos Medical Faculty Development Program was designed to provide four-year postdoctoral research awards offered to historically disadvantaged physicians who are committed to developing careers in academic medicine, to improving the health of underserved populations, and to furthering the understanding and elimination of health disparities.Asthma is a significant public health issue affecting nearly 7 million children in the United States and morbidity is highest in urban neighborhoods where exposure to pollution is greatest. Exercise can improve asthma symptoms; however, the relationship between exercise in urban polluted environments and symptoms of asthma in children is not well understood. The objective of this project is to investigate the combined effects of air pollution exposure and outdoor exercise on asthma symptoms among children living in urban neighborhoods with assessment of both community level and individual exposures. It is hypothesized that children that live in neighborhoods with high pollutant exposure and participate in outdoor sports and activities have the highest risk of asthma symptoms compared to children that have low pollutant exposure or do not play outdoors. The grantee will investigate these relationships in a birth cohort of children ages 10-14 years living in New York City, Boston, Baltimore, and St. Louis.