What Are the Diseases Caused by Environmental Exposure?
By Beth Rush
Staying healthy is a lifelong effort. You can get flu shots and follow a well-rounded diet, but some illnesses don’t come from viruses.
People also contract diseases caused by environmental exposure without realizing it. Learning how the planet could affect your health will empower you while you decide how best to manage your well-being.
Digital Pathology Data Unlocks the Connections
Researchers wouldn’t know which diseases connect to pollution without digital pathology data. Experts estimate that 129 million Americans live with chronic conditions that often relate to viruses, genetics or lifestyle choices. Although those factors can influence your health, your local ecosystem can be even more powerful.
Digital pathology data uses artificial intelligence (AI) to analyze cases and make connections so patient diagnoses are more accurate. AI can also comb through environmental factors related to a patient’s location before recommending potential diagnoses to medical providers.
Health disparities related to a person’s biome — like the air they breathe or the water they drink — are easier to spot with technology that pulls all relevant information into one place prior to diagnosis.
When more health care experts use tools like digital pathology data, their patients can better understand how their ecosystem affects their well-being. You could also use the information to promote equity in environmental policy. If local leaders hear that their constituents have identified pollutants harming their health, they can create legislation to more comprehensively address everyone’s modern-day needs.
What Diseases Are Caused by Environmental Exposure?
Understanding which conditions are most related to a person’s geographic region is helpful in numerous ways. Once you know what they are, you’ll see how pollution can affect well-being and which may be more relevant to your daily life.
Asthma
People might imagine that asthma is something kids grow out of, but that isn’t always true. Air pollutants can trigger attacks in people of all ages by causing an increased presence of lymphocytes, eosinophils and mast cells in airways.
The condition is one of the many diseases caused by environmental exposure that’s hard to match with airborne pollutants since they’re often invisible to the human eye. Disease pathology technology could potentially link recent increases in local toxins with a patient presenting asthma symptoms.
Cardiovascular Disease
Environmental exposure may harm a person’s cardiovascular disease in numerous ways. Toxins in the air could travel through the bloodstream after entering the lungs. Chemicals in waterways do the same thing. When they reach the heart, disease can progress in even an overall healthy person.
The connection is something to remember if you live in a contaminant-prone area and are already at risk of heart disease due to your genetics. Taking steps to filter your water, clean your air or avoid areas of town with manufacturing facilities that create localized pollution could help you better manage your health.
Cancer
Pollutants in the bloodstream may also cause cancerous growths. Experts found that people breathing air with high particular matter ratings were 8% more likely to develop breast cancer because the chemicals functioned as endocrine disruptors.
While you might get a cancer diagnosis and assume it’s related to your genetics or lifestyle choices, it could also occur due to local pollution rates. Empowering patients with ecological data that relates to their health conditions might help them understand their situation and potentially advocate for change so the same disease does not affect others.
Birth Defects
Toxins can also contain metals like mercury that plants absorb. Whether you drink contaminated water or eat local produce, exposure to mercury can cause birth defects that leave newborns with lifelong health conditions.
The same research shows that noise pollution may cause certain diagnoses. Loud sounds from high-traffic areas increase hormone levels in pregnant women and lead to birth defects. Babies can also live with systolic blood pressure due to high stress levels perpetuated by consistently loud outdoor noises. Doctors who take environmental factors into account when diagnosing patients may provide more accurate medical care.
How to Use Data to Shape Your Future
Learning about how the natural world could affect your health through digital pathology data leaves you with more options. Stay up to date on local environmental news to monitor pollution where you live. Watch for symptoms that may indicate a developing disease, and don’t hesitate to make an appointment with your doctor if anything feels different about your body.
You can also use your newfound understanding to advocate for equity in ecological policy. Improving regional conditions for everyone who lives in your town could reduce the number of patients developing pollution-related diseases. If more people understand how they connect, communities can push for the change they need based on local contaminant data.
Protect Your Health and the Environment
Understanding the diseases caused by environmental exposure could help you better monitor your wellness. Learn about the primary sources of pollution in your region, consider how close you live to them and keep that information in mind as you evaluate your health. You could get an accurate diagnosis faster and make positive changes in your community by staying curious about how the local ecosystem may affect your well-being.
About the author: Beth Rush is the green wellness editor at Body+Mind, where she covers topics like the power of climate consciousness at all stages of education. You can find Beth on Twitter @bodymindmag. Subscribe to Body+Mind for more posts by Beth!