Image credit: Tina Franklin / CC BY 2.0Although it should come as no surprise that there is a link between breathing in polluted air and having chronic sinus issues, little evidence has been published on the connection. Now, researchers at Johns Hopkins University have published their findings on the direct cause and effect relationship of breathing in polluted air and developing sinus issues in the American Journal of Respiratory Cell and Molecular Biology.

The connection between asthma and breathing in air pollutants (smog, ash, etc.) is well-documented. However, there is very little research available making that same connection to upper respiratory illnesses, including sinusitis and other sinus illnesses that cause pressure, inflammation, pain, congestion and stuffy or runny noses.

Researchers at Johns Hopkins were able to make the connection by observing two groups of mice. The 38, eight-week-old mice were split into two different groups: those exposed to filtered air and those exposed to polluted air. After subjecting the two groups to the two different types of air for six hours a day, five days a week for 16 weeks, researchers flushed out the sinuses of the mice.

Not surprisingly, all of the indicators of the presence of inflammation and sinus deterioration appeared in the mice exposed to the polluted air, with the researchers describing the symptoms as "a kind of asthma of the nose."

“Inflammation that attracts eosinophils is what happens in the lungs of people with asthma, so essentially the chronic exposure to air pollution in mice is leading to a kind of asthma of the nose,” says Murray Ramanathan, M.D., associate professor of otolaryngology—head and neck surgery at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

The team will continue to investigate the link between air pollution and sinus issues. For more information on the research, go to American Journal of Respiratory Cell and Molecular Biology.