Objective To assess the impacts of daily average concentrations of air pollutants including PM2.5, PM10, NO2, O3, CO, and SO2 on the number of visits for respiratory diseases of children in Wuhan City.
Methods The data of selected air pollutants, meteorology, and cases of respiratory diseases of children who visited the Hubei Maternal and Child Health Hospital were collected from 2015 to 2016. Spearman correlation was used to analyze the correlations of six air pollutants with average temperature and relative humidity. Generalized additive model (GAM) was used to analyze the la g effects (lag1-lag5) and cumulative lag effects (lag0:1-lag0:5) of air pollutants on the outpatient visits in children for upper respiratory tract disease, lower respiratory tract disease, and respiratory disease, after controlling factors such as day of the week, meteorological factors, and holidays. The maximum effect value was selected as the exposure risk estimate of the impact of air pollutants on pediatric respiratory disease outpatient visits.
Results For the cumulative lag effect, an IQR increase in air pollutant concentration was associated with the increase in the total number of visits for pediatric respiratory diseaseexcess risk (ER), 95% CI:PM2.5 (lag0:4), 1.78%(0.12%-3.46%); PM10 (lag0:5), 3.48%(0.49%-6.56%); NO2 (lag0:5), 6.59%(3.75%-9.52%); CO (lag0:5), 3.27%(0.02%-6.63%); SO2 (lag0:5), 3.66%(0.62%-6.80%); and O3 (lag0:4), 2.65% (0.03%-5.29%). The ER for total number of visits all reached the highest after 4-5 days of cumulative lag. For the lag effect:the ER of lower respiratory tract disease reached the highest on lag day 5 for PM2.5, PM10, NO2, CO, and SO2; the ER of upper respiratory tract disease reached the highest on current day for PM2.5, PM10, and SO2, and on lag day 4 for NO2 and CO; there was no significant correlation between the number of visits for lower respiratory tract disease and O3 (P > 0.05).
Conclusion Elevated concentrations of selected six air pollutants in Wuhan City have significant influences on the number of visits for respiratory disease in children, and obvious lag effects on lower respiratory tract disease.
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