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. 2003 Jul;88(7):587–590. doi: 10.1136/adc.88.7.587

Therapeutic implications of sex differences in asthma and atopy

M Osman 1
PMCID: PMC1763154  PMID: 12818904

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Figure 1.

Figure 1

Asthma admissions (ICD J45) for all hospitals in Scotland from April 2000 to April 2001 by selected age groups and sex. (Source: Scottish Morbidity Data Information and Statistics Division, Common Services Agency, NHS Scotland)

Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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