Applying the atmospheric visibility to assess the effects of air pollution on the hospital admissions for respiratory diseases

• Main Authors: Chia-Hsin Yang, 楊佳興
• Other Authors: Shih-Yu Chang
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2015
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/56908389054739142928

碩士 === 中山醫學大學 === 公共衛生學系碩士班 === 103 === Recently, air pollution has played an important role in causing a hazard to human health. The atmospheric visibility was the aggregative indicator of air pollution and meteorological condition. Although the visibility might be regarded as a direct indicator of determining the air quality, rare studies reported the relationship between the atmospheric visibility and health risk. This thesis tried to apply the atmospheric visibility to assess the effects of air pollution on the hospital admissions for respiratory diseases (ICD-9: 460-519). Daily measurements of air pollutants, atmospheric visibility, and Taiwan''s National Health Insurance Research Database were obtained for the period of one year in 2010 in Taichung. We compared the difference in different locations (coast and urban areas) and weather conditions (transported and non-transported types). Poisson regression analysis was also used to evaluate the relationship between the atmospheric visibility and the respiratory consultation rate, with adjustment for potential confounding including the meteorological factors and spatial variances and types of air pollution. The primary results indicated that air pollution and visibility degradation were both more serious in the urban area than that in the coast area. There were significantly relative health risks of 1.088 in the coast area and 1.042 in the urban area under the hazard periods of atmospheric visibility ≤ 10 kilometers. The two areas which divided into Q1(The 25th percentile), Q2(The 50th percentile), Q3(The 75th percentile) distinction respectively, showing the inversely proportional trend between visibility range and health risks. Similar results can also be validated in different weather conditions. This study establishes the new point of view to assess the effects of air pollution on the hospital admissions for respiratory disease by applying the atmospheric visibility. It also provides the convenient way for public to understand the relationship between the regional air pollution and the effect of human health.