Ambient Air Pollution, Meteorological Factors and Outpatient Visits for Eczema in Shanghai, China: A Time-Series Analysis.
Environmental irritants are important risk factors for skin diseases, but little is known about the influence of environmental factors on eczema incidence. In this time-series study, our objective was to examine the associations of environmental factors with outpatient visits for eczema. Daily outpatient visits between 2007 and 2011 (1826 days) were collected from Huashan Hospital in Shanghai, China. We used an overdispersed generalized additive model to investigate the short-term association between environmental factors and outpatient visits for eczema. Daily outpatient visits for eczema were significantly associated with air pollution and meteorological factors. For example, a 10 μg/m³ increase of 7-day (lag 06) average concentrations of PM10(particulate matter no greater than 10 microns), SO₂, NO₂ was associated with 0.81% (95% confidence intervals (CI) 0.39%, 1.22%), 2.22% (95% CI: 1.27%, 3.16%) and 2.31% (95% CI: 1.17%, 3.45%) increase in outpatient visits for eczema, respectively. A 10 °C elevation of temperature on lag 0 day were associated with 8.44% (95% CI: 4.66%, 12.22%) increase in eczema visits, whereas 10 unit decrease of 7-day average relative humidity were associated with 10.86% (95% CI: 8.83%, 12.89%) increase in eczema visits. This study provided clear evidence of ambient air pollution, high temperature and low relative humidity on increasing the incidence of eczema in Shanghai, China.
Department of Dermatology, Huashan Hospital, Fudan University, Shanghai 200040, China. 06307070005@fudan.edu.cn.
Qiao
Q
Li
Department of Women's and Children's Health Care, Shanghai First Maternity and Infant Hospital, Tongji University School of Medicine, Shanghai 201204, China. yyjenny1214@163.com.
Yingying
Y
Yang
Key Laboratory of Public Health Safety of the Ministry of Education and Key Laboratory of Health Technology Assessment of the Ministry of Health, School of Public Health, Fudan University, Shanghai 200040, China. crj_1986@163.com.
Renjie
R
Chen
Key Laboratory of Public Health Safety of the Ministry of Education and Key Laboratory of Health Technology Assessment of the Ministry of Health, School of Public Health, Fudan University, Shanghai 200040, China. kanh@fudan.edu.cn.
Haidong
H
Kan
Key Laboratory of Public Health Safety of the Ministry of Education and Key Laboratory of Health Technology Assessment of the Ministry of Health, School of Public Health, Fudan University, Shanghai 200040, China. wmsong@shmu.edu.cn.
Weimin
W
Song
Shanghai Key Laboratory of Meteorological and Health, Shanghai 200135, China. tanjg@mail.typhoon.gov.cn.
Jianguo
J
Tan
Department of Dermatology, Huashan Hospital, Fudan University, Shanghai 200040, China. xufengdoctor@126.com.
Feng
F
Xu
Department of Dermatology, Huashan Hospital, Fudan University, Shanghai 200040, China. xujinhua2012@sina.com.
Jinhua
J
Xu
D000393:Air Pollutants / Q000633:toxicity*; D000397:Air Pollution / Q000009:adverse effects*; D002681:China / Q000453:epidemiology; D004485:Eczema / Q000139:chemically induced / Q000453:epidemiology*; D006801:Humans; D006813:Humidity; D015994:Incidence; D010045:Outpatients / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D013696:Temperature
D000393:Air Pollutants
air pollution; eczema; meteorological factors; outpatient visit; time-series study