Ambient air pollution and allergic disease among children
Fan KC1, Ho WC1, Lin MH1, Caffrey JL2, Lin YS3, Pan SC1, Chen PC4, Wu TN1, Sung FC1, Lin RS5 1 Institute of Public Health, China Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan
2 University of North Texas Health Science Centre, Department of Integrative Physiology and
Cardiovascular Research Institute Fort Worth, TX
3 National Center for Environmental Assessment, Office of Research and Development, U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC
4 Institute of Occupational Medicine and Industrial Hygiene, National Taiwan University
College of Public Health, Taipei, Taiwan
5 Institute of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine, National Taiwan University College of
Public Health, Taipei, Taiwan
The prevalence of childhood eczema, allergic rhinitis, and asthma has been increasing worldwide. Air pollution related to allergic diseases has been an important public health issues, especially for highly sensitive group like children. Critical exposure window could occur for air pollution related to allergic diseases, especially during embryo, 0 to 1 years old, and 1-2 years old. The purpose of this study is to assess the potential adverse health effects of air pollution related to allergic diseases (eczema, allergic rhinitis and asthma). There are two databases used in this study: 1) Longitudinal Health Insurance Database 2005 (LHID2005) and 2) Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) air monitoring database. Geographic Information Systems (GIS) will be used in estimating air pollution exposure. Furthermore, Cox proportional hazard regression models will be used in adjusting sex, geographic area, urbanization level, household Environmental Tobacco Smoking (ETS) exposure and lead concentrations in air within three periods of exposure time, 10 months before birth, 0 to1 years old, and 1 to 2 years old. All statistical analyses will be
performed with the SAS version 9.3 (SAS Institute, Cary, NC, USA). In other study indicate that components of PM2.5 were associated with hospitalization
for several childhood respiratory diseases including pneumonia, bronchitis, and asthma. Therefore we find that long-term air pollution exposure not only
associated with asthma, but also affect children’s lung function and cause allergic disease.
