Evidence Hub

Impact of Long-Term Exposure to Wind Turbine Noise on Redemption of Sleep Medication and Antidepressants: A Nationwide Cohort Study

A. Poulsen, O. Raaschou-Nielsen, A. Peña, A. Hahmann, R. B. Nordsborg, M. Ketzel, J. Brandt, M. Sørensen

Environmental Health Perspectives, 2019

68,696 participants · 37 citations

Abstract

Background: Noise from wind turbines (WTs) is associated with annoyance and, potentially, sleep disturbances. Objectives: Our objective was to investigate whether long-term WT noise (WTN) exposure is associated with the redemption of prescriptions for sleep medication and antidepressants. Methods: For all Danish dwellings within a radius of 20-WT heights and for 25% of randomly selected dwellings within a radius of 20-to 40-WT heights, we estimated nighttime outdoor and low-frequency (LF) indoor WTN, using information on WT type and simulated hourly wind. During follow-up from 1996 to 2013, 68,696 adults redeemed sleep medication and 82,373 redeemed antidepressants, from eligible populations of 583,968 and 584,891, respectively. We used Poisson regression with adjustment for individual and area-level covariates. Results: Five-year mean outdoor nighttime WTN of ≥42 dB was associated with a hazard ratio (HR) = 1.14 [95% confidence interval (CI]: 0.98, 1.33) for sleep medication and HR = 1.17 (95% CI: 1.01, 1.35) for antidepressants (compared with exposure to WTN of <24 dB). We found no overall association with indoor nighttime LF WTN. In age-stratified analyses, the association with outdoor nighttime WTN was strongest among persons ≥65y of age, with HRs (95% CIs) for the highest exposure group (≥42 dB) of 1.68 (1.27, 2.21) for sleep medication and 1.23 (0.90, 1.69) for antidepressants. For indoor nighttime LF WTN, the HRs (95% CIs) among persons ≥65y of age exposed to ≥15 dB…

How strong is the evidence?

Evidence Hub reads this as a cohort study, done in people. Its evidence level is 3 of 5 (Moderate · trial / cohort / secondary analysis). Trials without a large randomized design, cohorts and secondary analyses give moderate evidence. Reported size: 68,696 participants or records.

How the five levels of evidence work. The level is assigned automatically from the abstract and can be wrong, so check the paper.

Read the paper

Related studies

Go deeper in Evidence Hub

Evidence Hub adds a study data sheet (design, sample size, evidence level, key numbers), an AI summary and a chat grounded in the paper's text.

Open this study Sign up free