Residential Proximity to Agricultural Fields and Neurological and Mental Health Outcomes in Rural Adults in Matlab, Bangladesh.

Pesticide exposure is an important rural public health concern that is linked to a spectrum of health outcomes in farmers. However, little is known about these effects on residents living in close proximity to agricultural fields and who are not involved in regular farming. This paper compared the effects of residential proximity to farming lands on a number of neurological and mental health outcomes in adults. A cross-sectional study was performed on 57 adults involved in farming only occasionally in rural Matlab in Bangladesh. A health and demographic surveillance system (HDSS) and geocoding were used to define proximity to the agricultural field. Neurological health was measured using the trail making test, vibrotactile threshold measurement, and dominant ulnar nerve conduction velocity (NCV) amplitude. An adapted Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression scale (CES-D) questionnaire was used to evaluate mental health. Results indicated that respondents living near agricultural fields had significantly higher vibrotactile threshold in big toes (p < 0.004) and needed a longer time to complete the trail making test (p < 0.004) than those living far from fields after accounting for the covariates. Results of this pilot study suggest further investigations to establish the impact of pesticide exposure among occasional and non-farmers on neurological health outcomes.

4-Hydroxy-4,6a,6b,9,9,12a,14b-heptamethylperhydropicen-3-one hemihydrate isolated from Adiantum incisum.

The title compound, C(29)H(48)O(2)·0.5H(2)O, is a triterpenoid isolated from the stems and rhizomes of Adiantum incisum. The basic skeleton of the mol-ecule contains five six-membered rings, all adopting chair conformations, bearing a total of seven methyl, one hydroxyl and a keto group. There are two mol-ecules of the triterpene and one water molecule of crystallization in the asymmetric unit. The two unique triterpenoid mol-ecules hydrogen-bond directly via an O-H⋯O=C inter-action, and are also bridged by the water mol-ecule. The water also bridges to another pair of hydrogen-bonded triterpenoid mol-ecules.