Environmental toxic metal contaminants and risk of cardiovascular disease: systematic review and meta-analysis
- PMID: 30158148
- PMCID: PMC6113772
- DOI: 10.1136/bmj.k3310
Environmental toxic metal contaminants and risk of cardiovascular disease: systematic review and meta-analysis
Abstract
Objective: To conduct a systematic review and meta-analysis of epidemiological studies investigating the association of arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury, and copper with cardiovascular disease.
Design: Systematic review and meta-analysis.
Data sources: PubMed, Embase, and Web of Science searched up to December 2017.
Review methods: Studies reporting risk estimates for total cardiovascular disease, coronary heart disease, and stroke for levels of arsenic, lead, cadmium, mercury, or copper were included. Two investigators independently extracted information on study characteristics and outcomes in accordance with PRISMA and MOOSE guidelines. Relative risks were standardised to a common scale and pooled across studies for each marker using random effects meta-analyses.
Results: The review identified 37 unique studies comprising 348 259 non-overlapping participants, with 13 033 coronary heart disease, 4205 stroke, and 15 274 cardiovascular disease outcomes in aggregate. Comparing top versus bottom thirds of baseline levels, pooled relative risks for arsenic and lead were 1.30 (95% confidence interval 1.04 to 1.63) and 1.43 (1.16 to 1.76) for cardiovascular disease, 1.23 (1.04 to 1.45) and 1.85 (1.27 to 2.69) for coronary heart disease, and 1.15 (0.92 to 1.43) and 1.63 (1.14 to 2.34) for stroke. Relative risks for cadmium and copper were 1.33 (1.09 to 1.64) and 1.81 (1.05 to 3.11) for cardiovascular disease, 1.29 (0.98 to 1.71) and 2.22 (1.31 to 3.74) for coronary heart disease, and 1.72 (1.29 to 2.28) and 1.29 (0.77 to 2.17) for stroke. Mercury had no distinctive association with cardiovascular outcomes. There was a linear dose-response relation for arsenic, lead, and cadmium with cardiovascular disease outcomes.
Conclusion: Exposure to arsenic, lead, cadmium, and copper is associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease and coronary heart disease. Mercury is not associated with cardiovascular risk. These findings reinforce the importance of environmental toxic metals in cardiovascular risk, beyond the roles of conventional behavioural risk factors.
Published by the BMJ Publishing Group Limited. For permission to use (where not already granted under a licence) please go to http://group.bmj.com/group/rights-licensing/permissions.
Conflict of interest statement
Competing interests: All authors have completed the ICMJE uniform disclosure form at www.icmje.org/coi_disclosure.pdf and declare: no support from any organisation for the submitted work; no financial relationships with any organisations that might have an interest in the submitted work in the previous three years; no other relationships or activities that could appear to have influenced the submitted work. RC is the Co-Principal Investigator for the UK Research Council UK’s £8.1M CAPABLE Global Health Programme, which is investigating the roles of toxic metals and air pollutants on future noncommunicable disease outcomes in Bangladesh and elsewhere.
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Comment in
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Environmental metals and cardiovascular disease.BMJ. 2018 Aug 29;362:k3435. doi: 10.1136/bmj.k3435. BMJ. 2018. PMID: 30158104 Free PMC article.
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