Source-specific contributions of particulate matter to asthma-related pediatric emergency department utilization.

UNLABELLED

Ambient particulate matter smaller than 2.5 μm (PM) is associated with different chronic diseases. It is crucial to identify the sources of ambient particulate matter to reduce the impact on health. Still, only a few studies have been linked with specific ambient particulate matter sources. In this study, we estimated the contributions of sources of PM and examined their association with daily asthma hospital utilization in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA. We used a model-based clustering method to group days with similar source-specific contributions into six distinct clusters. Specifically, elevated PM concentrations occurring on days characterized by low coal combustion contributions showed a significantly reduced risk of hospital utilization for asthma (rate ratio: 0.86, 95% CI: [0.77, 0.95]) compared to other clusters. Reducing coal combustion contribution to PM levels could be an effective intervention for lowering asthma-related hospital utilization.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s13755-021-00141-z.