GCAT Health and Environment study starts

Today we have started the GCAT Health and Environment study to understand how the environment impacts to our health. The IGTP, together with ISGlobal and GCAT volunteers, starting with the GCAT project team of scientists, have begun to monitor in the GCAT cohort the air quality, physical activity, sleep quality, noise, light, the proximity to transit areas and access to green areas, among others, to which we are exposed in our day to day.

The GCAT Health and Environment study will use Advanced Geographic Information Models to analyze these factors in the global GCAT 20,000 volunteers. But first, in order to validate these models, we are conducting a controlled pilot study, measuring the impact directly on a small group of volunteers in an urban environment, in the cities of Barcelona and Girona.

To obtain these measures, 200 volunteers who are already part of the GCAT are going to collaborate again. With their collaboration we will obtain continuous measures for 7 days at home and on ordinary trips, using personalized portable devices; a digital wristwatch that allows to measure the levels of personal light exposure and heart rate, a bracelet (a new prototype given by The Yale University, USA) to measure the levels of air pollution - specifically the NO₂ levels - exposed, and a geolocalizable mobile device to trace the weekly travel and quantify the physical activity carried out.

Personalized portable devices of the GCAT Health and Environment study