Air Pollutants and Daily Outpatient Visits for Cardiovascular and Cerebrovascular Diseases in Central Taiwan

Abstract

BACKGROUND AND AIM: This study aimed to evaluate the health impacts of air pollutants and meteorological factors (fog, haze, and low cloud) under megacity conditions in central Taiwan. In addition, we used the Kriging interpolation and land use regression for more accurate exposure assessment. METHODS: We retrieved daily records of outpatient department (OPD) visits from the Health and Welfare Data Science Center of the Ministry of Health and Welfare of Taiwan and included those for ischemic heart and cerebrovascular diseases (ICD-9 codes 410 to 414 and 430 to 438; ICD-10 codes: I20 to 25 and I60 to I69) in 2016. We combined the air pollution data on the level of fine aerosol and chemical components obtained from the air quality monitoring stations established by the Environmental Protection Administration in the Taichung and Nantou areas with the meteorological data obtained from the Central Weather Bureau to assess their associations with the OPD visits. Autoregressive integrated moving average and classification and regression trees models were constructed to evaluate and describe the effects of air pollutants and meteorological factors on the OPD visits for ischemic heart and cerebrovascular diseases. RESULTS:The PM2.5 measured at station in Nantou and Changhua were significantly higher than those measured at stations in Taichung. The OPD visits for cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases by residents nearby the station in Nantou and Changhua were also significantly more than those paid by residents nearby the stations in Taichung. OPD visits for ischemic heart and cerebrovascular diseases had positive association with PM2.5 concentration on the same day and the day before. CONCLUSIONS:The level of PM2.5 was associated with OPD visits for ischemic heart and cerebrovascular diseases on the same day and the next day. Further studies are needed to identify the susceptible populations and evaluate the impacts. KEYWORDS: Fine particulate matters, air pollution, and cardiovascular diseases