title: Are high barometric pressure, low humidity and diurnal change of temperature related to the onset of asthmatic symptoms?
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Meteorologic factors play a role in the expression of asthmatic symptoms; however, there are controversies about the causal relationship between meteorologic factors and asthma. The relationship between meteorologic parameters and emergency admissions for asthmatic symptoms in this hospital were analyzed.
  
  
  METHODS
  A total of 205 patients (130 boys and 75 girls, 0.1-16.6 years of age) who were admitted to Hakodate Chuo General Hospital for asthmatic symptoms between 1 January and 31 December 1997 were submitted to our study. We divided a total of 365 days into two groups of days with and without any admissions. Meteorologic factors for the days with admissions and 1-3 days before hospitalization were compared with those of the days of no admissions. Statistical analysis was done with the Mann-Whitney U-test.
  
  
  RESULTS
  On the days with admissions and 1 day before hospitalizations, barometric pressure was higher and relative humidity lower than on days with no admissions. The diurnal difference between maximum and minimum temperature for days 1 day before days with admissions was larger than that for 1 day before days with no admissions.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  It is thought that change in barometric pressure, relative humidity and temperature had some influence on the worsening of asthmatic symptoms.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, Hakodate Chuo General Hospital, Hokkaido, Japan. akira.ehara@nifty.ne.jp
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Ehara
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Takasaki
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Takeda
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kida
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Mizukami
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hagisawa
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Yamada
mesh_terms: D001249:Asthma / Q000209:etiology*; D001274:Atmospheric Pressure; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006760:Hospitalization; D006801:Humans; D006813:Humidity / Q000009:adverse effects*; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008297:Male; D010507:Periodicity; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric; D013696:Temperature