Associations between atmospheric particulate matter exposure and ischemic heart disease: A review of epidemiological studies

Ischemic heart disease (IHD) is the second most common cause of death in cardiovascular diseases in China, next to stroke, and the correlations between particulate matter (PM) exposure and IHD are noteworthy to study. This review collected domestic and foreign epidemiological studies on PM and IHD, explored the associations between PM and IHD from the perspective of particle sizes and regional differences, and analyzed the effects of PM exposure on IHD under different environmental factors. The results support the relationships between PM exposure and IHD death:for per 10 μg·m^-3 increase in PM_2.5 and PM₁₀ concentrations, the combined effect values of IHD mortality are 1.0236 (95%CI:1.0184-1.0288) and 1.0106 (95%CI:1.0075-1.0137) respectively, and also indicate that PM stimulation is tightly associated with increased IHD occurrence. Most of the studies focus on the effects of PM₁₀ and PM_2.5 on IHD in Asian and North American countries. However, the research data on PM₁ exposure and IHD in Asian and North American countries and on PM and IHD in regions out of Asia and North America are insufficient. Epidemiological studies about the impacts of different environmental factors on PM-caused IHD are also scant and need to be further extended.