Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Department of Environmental and Occupational Health, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV 89154, USA.
Department of Bioenvironmental Systems Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei 10617, Taiwan.
Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2018 Apr 23;15(4):829. doi: 10.3390/ijerph15040829.
Recent studies have revealed the influence of fine particulate matter (PM) on increased medication use, hospital admission, and emergency room visits for asthma attack in children, but the lagged influence of PM on children’s asthma and geographic disparities of children’s asthma have rarely been discussed simultaneously. This study investigated the documented diagnosis of children’s asthma in clinic visits for children aged less than 15 years old that were associated with PM in two counties located in west-central Taiwan during 2005⁻2010. The result shows that PM had a significant lagged effect on children’s asthma for up to 6 days. A significantly higher relative risk for children’s asthma was more likely to happen at 2-day lag compared to the present day when PM increased from 36.17 μg/m³ to 81.26 μg/m³. Considering all lagged effects, the highest relative risk for children’s asthma was 1.08 (95% CI = 1.05, 1.11) as PM increased as high as 64.66 μg/m³. In addition, geographic disparities of children’s asthma were significant, and 47.83% of areas were identified to have children vulnerable to asthma. To sum up, our findings can serve as a valuable reference for the implementation of an early warning to governmental agencies about a susceptible population of children.
最近的研究揭示了细颗粒物（PM）对儿童药物使用增加、住院和因哮喘发作而到急诊室就诊的影响，但 PM 对儿童哮喘的滞后影响以及儿童哮喘的地理差异很少被同时讨论。本研究调查了在台湾中西部的两个县，在 2005 年至 2010 年期间，PM 与年龄小于 15 岁的儿童门诊就诊记录中儿童哮喘的关联。结果表明，PM 对儿童哮喘的滞后影响长达 6 天。与 PM 从 36.17μg/m³增加到 81.26μg/m³的当日相比，PM 增加 36.17μg/m³至 81.26μg/m³时，儿童哮喘的相对风险明显更高。考虑到所有滞后效应，当 PM 高达 64.66μg/m³时，儿童哮喘的最高相对风险为 1.08（95%CI=1.05，1.11）。此外，儿童哮喘的地理差异显著，有 47.83%的地区被确定为儿童哮喘易感性地区。总之，我们的研究结果可以为政府机构实施针对易感人群的早期预警提供有价值的参考。
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