Year: 2021
Type: Article
Title: Early environmental quality and life-course mental health effects: The Equal-Life project
Author: Kamp, Irene van
Author: Persson Waye, Kerstin
Author: Kanninen, Katja
Author: Gulliver, John
Author: Bozzon, Alessandro
Author: Psyllidis, Achilleas
Author: Boshuizen, Hendriek
Author: Selander, Jenny
Author: van den Hazel, Peter
Author: Brambilla, Marco
Author: Foraster, Maria
Author: Julvez, Jordi
Author: Klatte, Maria
Author: Jeram, Sonja
Author: Lercher, Peter
Author: Botteldooren, Dick
Author: Ristovska, Gordana
Author: Kaprio, Jaakko
Author: Schreckenberg, Dirk
Author: Hornikx, Maarten
Author: Fels, Janina
Author: Weber, Miriam
Author: Braat-Eggen, Ella
Author: Hartmann, Julia
Author: Clark, Charlotte
Author: Vrijkotte, Tanja
Author: Brown, Lex
Author: Bolte, Gabriele
Author: Equal-Life Scientific Team
Abstract: Background: There is increasing evidence that a complex interplay of factors within environments in which children grows up, contributes to children’s suboptimal mental health and cognitive development. The concept of the life-course exposome helps to study the impact of the physical and social environment, including social inequities, on cognitive development and mental health over time. Methods: Equal-Life develops and tests combined exposures and their effects on children’s mental health and cognitive development. Data from eight birth-cohorts and three school studies (N = 240.000) linked to exposure data, will provide insights and policy guidance into aspects of physical and social exposures hitherto untapped, at different scale levels and timeframes, while accounting for social inequities. Reasoning from the outcome point of view, relevant stakeholders participate in the formulation and validation of research questions, and in the formulation of environmental hazards. Exposure assessment combines GIS-based environmental indicators with omics approaches and new data sources, forming the early-life exposome. Statistical tools integrate data at different spatial and temporal granularity and combine exploratory machine learning models with hypothesis-driven causal modeling. Conclusions: Equal-Life contributes to the development and utilization of the exposome concept by (1) integrating the internal, physical and social exposomes, (2) studying a distinct set of life-course effects on a child’s development and mental health (3) characterizing the child’s environment at different developmental stages and in different activity spaces, (4) looking at supportive environments for child development, rather than merely pollutants, and (5) combining physical, social indicators with novel effect markers and using new data sources describing child activity patterns and environments. What this article adds Equal-Life, as part of the European Human Exposome Network, focuses uniquely on the effect of the internal and external exposome on mental health and cognitive development in children, with data available from conception to age 21 years. The discovery of new biomarkers for mental health and cognitive development has added scientific value. Traditional exposures with a negative health impact are combined with features promoting health by a novel approach to multimodal exposures. By including a positive outlook on physical and social environments Equal-Life stimulates a more holistic approach to environmental planning for different life stages and health equity.
Publisher: Ovid Technologies (Wolters Kluwer Health)
Relation: Equal-Life
Identifier: oai:repository.ukim.mk:20.500.12188/16124
Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12188/16124Identifier: 10.1097/ee9.0000000000000183
Identifier: https://journals.lww.com/10.1097/EE9.0000000000000183Identifier: 6
Identifier: 1
Identifier: e183
