The Bartlett School of Architecture, Faculty of the Built Environment, University College London, London WC1H 0QB, UK.
Bradford Institute for Health Research, Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Bradford BD9 6RJ, UK.
Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2023 Jan 20;20(3):1953. doi: 10.3390/ijerph20031953.
Environmental exposures (EE) are increasingly recognised as important determinants of health and well-being. Understanding the influences of EE on health is critical for effective policymaking, but better-quality spatial data is needed. This article outlines the theoretical and technical foundations used for the construction of individual-level environmental exposure measurements for the population of a northern English city, Bradford. The work supports 'Connected Bradford', an entire population database linking health, education, social care, environmental and other local government data over a period of forty years. We argue that our current understanding of environmental effects on health outcomes is limited both by methodological shortcomings in the quantification of the environment and by a lack of consistency in the measurement of built environment features. To address these shortcomings, we measure the environmental exposure for a series of different domains including air quality, greenspace and greenness, public transport, walkability, traffic, buildings and the built form, street centrality, land-use intensity, and food environments as well as indoor dwelling qualities. We utilise general practitioners' historical patient information to identify the precise geolocation and duration of a person's residence. We model a person's local neighbourhood, and the probable routes to key urban functions aggregated across the city. We outline the specific geospatial procedure used to quantify the environmental exposure for each domain and use the example of exposure to fast-food outlets to illustrate the methodological challenges in the creation of city and nationwide environmental exposure databases. The proposed EE measures will enable critical research into the relationship and causal links between the built environment and health, informing planning and policy-making.
环境暴露（EE）越来越被认为是健康和幸福的重要决定因素。了解 EE 对健康的影响对于有效的政策制定至关重要，但需要更好质量的空间数据。本文概述了用于构建英格兰北部城市布拉德福德的人群个体环境暴露测量的理论和技术基础。这项工作支持“互联布拉德福德”，这是一个将健康、教育、社会关怀、环境和其他地方政府数据在四十年期间链接起来的全人群数据库。我们认为，我们目前对环境对健康结果的影响的理解受到环境量化方法上的缺点和建筑环境特征测量缺乏一致性的限制。为了解决这些缺点，我们测量了一系列不同领域的环境暴露，包括空气质量、绿地和绿化、公共交通、可步行性、交通、建筑物和建筑形态、街道中心度、土地利用强度以及食物环境以及室内居住质量。我们利用全科医生的历史患者信息来确定一个人的确切地理位置和居住时间。我们模拟一个人的当地社区，以及聚集在整个城市的关键城市功能的可能路线。我们概述了用于量化每个领域环境暴露的特定地理空间程序，并以接触快餐店为例来说明创建城市和全国性环境暴露数据库的方法挑战。拟议的 EE 措施将使人们能够对建筑环境与健康之间的关系和因果关系进行关键研究，为规划和决策提供信息。
