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March 13, 2009 -- Whether you drive, take the bus, or bicycle, being in heavy traffic triples your risk of heart attack within one hour.

Air pollution from car fumes is the likely culprit, suggest Annette Peters, PhD, and colleagues at the Institute of Epidemiology, Helmholtz Center, Munich, Germany.

In a previous study, Peters and colleagues found that a sizeable proportion of heart attacks -- about 8% -- could be attributed to being in traffic.

To follow up, the researchers interviewed 1,454 people who survived heart attacks. In the hour before their heart attack, many of the survivors had been in heavy traffic.

Analysis of the data showed that these heart-attack-vulnerable people were 3.2 times more likely to suffer a heart attack if they'd been in heavy traffic in the previous hour.

Do you live in a big city or an area where you are sometimes forced to inhale car and truck exhaust? If so, you should strongly consider using a face mask, because exhaust causes arteries to lose their flexibility. Researchers writing in the journal Particle and Fibre Toxicology found that exposure to engine pollution resulted in arterial stiffness in a group of healthy volunteers.

Diesel exhaust inhalation causes vascular dysfunction and impaired endogenous fibrinolysis.
Mills NL, Törnqvist H, Robinson SD, Gonzalez M, Darnley K, MacNee W, Boon NA, Donaldson K, Blomberg A, Sandstrom T, Newby DE.
Circulation. 2005 Dec 20;112(25):3930-6.
PMID: 16365212
doi: 10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.105.588962

Persistent endothelial dysfunction in humans after diesel exhaust inhalation.
Törnqvist H, Mills NL, Gonzalez M, Miller MR, Robinson SD, Megson IL, Macnee W, Donaldson K, Söderberg S, Newby DE, Sandström T, Blomberg A.
Am J Respir Crit Care Med. 2007 Aug 15;176(4):395-400. Epub 2007 Apr 19.
PMID: 17446340
doi: 10.1164/rccm.200606-872OC

Exposure to diesel exhaust induces changes in EEG in human volunteers.
Crüts B, van Etten L, Törnqvist H, Blomberg A, Sandström T, Mills NL, Borm PJ.
Part Fibre Toxicol. 2008 Mar 11;5:4.
PMID: 18334019
doi:10.1186/1743-8977-5-4

Ischemic and thrombotic effects of dilute diesel-exhaust inhalation in men with coronary heart disease.
Mills NL, Törnqvist H, Gonzalez MC, Vink E, Robinson SD, Söderberg S, Boon NA, Donaldson K, Sandström T, Blomberg A, Newby DE.
N Engl J Med. 2007 Sep 13;357(11):1075-82.
PMID: 17855668

Diesel exhaust inhalation increases thrombus formation in man.
Lucking AJ, Lundback M, Mills NL, Faratian D, Barath SL, Pourazar J, Cassee FR, Donaldson K, Boon NA, Badimon JJ, Sandstrom T, Blomberg A, Newby DE.
Eur Heart J. 2008 Dec;29(24):3043-51. Epub 2008 Oct 24.
PMID: 18952612