Table A53.
Summary of findings table for the association between aircraft noise exposure at school and the change in systolic blood pressure in children.
| Question | Does Exposure to Aircraft Noise Affect Blood Pressure | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| People | Children (boys and girls) | |||
| Setting | Educational setting: Children (aged 6–11 years) visiting primary schools in cities around Schiphol Amsterdam airport (The Netherlands), London Heathrow (United Kingdom) and Kingsford-Smith airport (Australia) | |||
| Outcome | Change in systolic blood pressure (mmHg) | |||
| Summary of findings | Change in systolic blood pressure level per 10 dB increase in aircraft noise level (LDEN) | - | ||
| Number of participants (# studies) | 2013 (2) | |||
| Number of cases | NR | |||
| Rating | Adjustment to rating | |||
| Quality assessment | Starting rating | 2 cross-sectional studies # | 2 (low) | |
| Factors decreasing confidence | Risk of bias | A lot is unclear a | Downgrading | |
| Inconsistency | Serious b | Downgrading | ||
| Indirectness | None c | No downgrading | ||
| Imprecision | Serious d | Downgrading | ||
| Publication bias | NA e | No downgrading | ||
| Factors increasing confidence | Strength of association | NA f | No upgrading | |
| Exposure-response gradient | NA f | No upgrading | ||
| Possible confounding | No conclusions can be drawn g | No upgrading | ||
| Overall judgement of quality of evidence | 0 (very low) | |||
# Since only cross-sectional studies were available, we started the grading with “low” (2); a The quality of the studies was judged as low, since response rates in both studies were higher than 60% and because of the difficulty to judge the quality of the blood pressure measurements; b One study found a positive effect; the other found a negative effect (see Figure 9.1 of the complete review); c The studies assessed population, exposure and outcome of interest; d The standard deviation of the reported effect size was larger than the mean difference in blood pressure; e Since the results of only two studies were available it was not possible to test for publication bias or small study bias; f It was not possible to combine the results of both studies. A meta-analysis was not carried out; g We were not able to draw any conclusions whether possible residual confounders or biases would reduce our effect estimate.