TAU Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences
A “greener” environment can help hear patients live longer. This is according to a new study from Israeli scientists at Tel Aviv University (TAU).
As if we did not already have enough reasons to increase the foliage – trees, gardens, etc., in urban areas, we now see that it would be good for our general health too. The new study examined thousands of heart patients post-bypass surgery and found that patients who live in a “greener” environment are at a lower risk of mortality when compared to patients who live in a “non-green” environment.
“The study’s findings are particularly relevant in the current period in Israel: they imply that exposure to a green environment may be a beneficial factor in recovering from trauma,” said the researchers.
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The scientists said their study was “unprecedented in its kind and scope.” The researchers from Tel Aviv University examined the association between a greener environment, which is most likely saturated with vegetation, and the mortality rate of coronary heart patients after undergoing bypass surgery – which is considered a traumatic event from both the physical and mental aspects. The study, which was carried out on thousands of patients who live all over the State of Israel and followed them over a period of more than 10 years, found that the survival rate of bypass surgery heart patients who live in greener areas is significantly greater than those whose living environment is devoid of greenery.
According to the American Heart Association, Cardiac rehabilitation doesn’t change your past, but it can help you improve your heart’s future. “Cardiac rehab is a medically supervised program designed to improve your cardiovascular health if you have experienced heart attack, heart failure, angioplasty or heart surgery,” it says. Well, now doctors might want to use greener surroundings in such rehab.
The study was conducted by PhD student Maya Sadeh under the guidance of Prof. Rachel Dankner from the Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine at the School of Public Health in the Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences and Prof. Alexandra Chudnovsky from the Porter School of Environment and Earth Sciences at TAU
Using data from Israel’s Ministry of the Interior the scientists reviewed 3,128 heart patients who underwent bypass surgery in seven medical centers in Israel, from Haifa to Beer Sheva, between the years 2004-2007. Of these patients, 1,442 (46%) died of various causes by the year 2021.
For the purpose of the study, the researchers cross-referenced the patients’ residential address data with data from NASA’s Landsat satellites, which photograph the Earth and are able to locate the color green with a very high resolution and within a range of up to 30×30 meters from the residential address – which allows identification of vegetation even within urban areas.
The researchers worked to accurately account for the amount of greenery in a radius of up to 300m around the address of each of the patients, and placed this figure against the dates of death or survival of the patients, over 14 years from the date of surgery. They performed a detailed statistical analysis of the data, including adjustments for a variety of variables, such as: age, sex, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, urgency of the hospitalization (elective, semi-elective, or emergency surgery), living in the periphery/center, air pollution, and living distance from the Mediterranean Sea. About 90% of the research participants lived in urban areas, 80% in the coastal plain from the center to Haifa, 15% in the Jerusalem area, and 5% in the southern Beer Sheva area.
“In this study, we examined the survival of coronary heart patients after undergoing bypass surgery, and found that living in a greener environment is associated with better chances of survival. We hypothesize that there are a variety of reasons for this: in a green environment, people breathe cleaner air and engage in more physical activity, the atmosphere may be calmer, and the quality of life is better overall,” the researchers concluded.
