Assessment of vital
capacity of adult females residing at two
different air pollutant zones of Kolkata, West
Bengal, India
Accepted 25th
September, 2013
Paulomi Das1 and Pinaki Chatterjee2*
1Department of Environmental Science, University of Kalyani, Kalyani-
741235, West Bengal, India. 2Faculty Councils for Postgraduate Studies, University of Kalyani,
Kalyani- 741235, West Bengal, India.
*Corresponding author. E-mail:
drpinakichattopadhyay@gmail.com.
Tel: 91-9007011642.
In Kolkata, air pollution has been a matter of
concern regarding health effect. The purpose of
the present study was to examine the association
between the levels of
air pollutants and vital capacity as well
as respiratory function of adult female residing
at two different air pollutant zones of Kolkata,
West Bengal. Ambient air quality monitoring data
of the two stations located at Rabindrabharati
(Station 1) and Victoria Memorial (Station 2)
was collected from West Bengal Pollution Control
Board, Kolkata for the period from January, 2012
to March, 2012. Two hundred females of the age
range 17 to 22 years were volunteered for the
study. They were subdivided into two groups from
living within 3 km radius of that two monitoring
stations. Vital capacity was measured in the
standing position with simple spirometer.
Results expressed as mean
±
SD were analyzed by independent samples T-test
for comparison between the two groups. From the
study, it was revealed that PM10 and SO2
concentrations were significantly higher
in station 1, whereas no significant differences
were noted in NO2 and CO
concentrations, though, values were higher at
station 1 than 2. Vital capacity was
significantly lower in females of station 1. The
relationship between higher pollutant
concentrations and reduced vital capacity
revealed that there may be an effect of air
pollution on vital capacity as well as, lung
function in the studied population.
Key words:
Air pollution, vital capacity, lung function,
female.
This is an open access article
published under the terms of the
Creative Commons Attribution
License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and
reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is
properly cited.
Cite this article as:
Das P, Chatterjee P (2014).
Assessment of vital capacity of adult females residing at two different air
pollutant zones of Kolkata, West Bengal, India. Acad. J. Environ. Sci. 2(1):
001-005.
