A longitudinal analysis for impact of region-specific temperature extremes on health outcomes

• Main Authors: Yu-Hsuan Liao, 廖于瑄
• Other Authors: 蕭朱杏
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2014
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/vah32z

碩士 === 國立臺灣大學 === 流行病學與預防醫學研究所 === 102 === The environmental factors like temperature and air pollutants have been recognized as important factors for human health, where mortality and morbidity of certain diseases may be related to the abrupt climate change or the air pollutant concentration. In order to clarify such effects and to account for the heterogeneity between different regions, we used different threshold values of extreme temperature, based on the 5th percentile of daily minimum temperature and the 95th percentile of daily maximum temperature, to define relative extreme temperature for each region. In addition, we adopted the definition of seven air quality regions in Taiwan to accommodate the differences in air pollution concentrations. We then applied a generalized linear model to evaluate the disease-associated factors on new cases of cerebrovascular disease and ischemic heart disease. Results showed that the local climate factors significantly influenced the occurrence of new cases of cerebrovascular disease and ischemic heart disease in certain regions, but not all. For instance, the high and low temperature extremes are associated with more cases of cardiovascular diseases in Kao-Ping, and Hua-Tung regions. However, in North, Yun-Chia-Nan, and Kao-Ping regions only high temperature extreme are associated with more new cases of ischemic heart disease; while only low temperature extreme correlates more new cases of ischemic heart disease in Yilan air quality region. To demonstrate the performance of our model, we also compared with other current statistical models. Our model provides better estimates and outperforms than other analyses.