Table 3.
Studies that examine the effect of meteorological factors on EDVs.
Meteorological risk factors | |||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Location | Author | Sample size | Temperature | Relative humidity | Thunderstorm | Fog | Wind speed | Rainfall | Key measures | Results | |
North America | |||||||||||
North Carolina, USA | Buckley and Richardson. [15] | 53, 156 | YES | Daily min./max. temperature | OR for EDVs per 278.15° K = 1.01, 95% CI: 1.00–1.02 | ||||||
Atlanta, USA | Grundstein et al. [17] | 215, 832 | YES | YES | YES | Total daily rainfall | EDVs 3% higher on days following thunderstorm | ||||
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Europe | |||||||||||
Oulu, Finland | Rossi et al. [22] | 232 | YES | YES | YES | Min./max. and mean temperature, relative humidity, rainfall | Increased EDVs during the summer due to higher temperature and humidity, (r = −0.11, p < 0.01) | ||||
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East Asia | |||||||||||
Chuncheon, Korea | Kwon et al. [18] | 660 | YES | YES | YES | YES | YES | Max./min./mean temp., temperature range, low and mean relative humidity, rainfall, fog present | Low relative humidity increased and fog decreased EDVs. Risk increase: 29.4% (95% CI: −46.3% to −7.2%, p=0.013) | ||
Tokyo, Japan | Abe et al. [6] | 643, 849 | YES | YES | YES | Min. temperature and max. relative humidity. Total rainfall | Lower temperature increases EDV by % 1.2 | ||||
Hong Kong | Qiu et al. [21] | 45, 896 | YES | YES | Daily diurnal temperature range | 274.15°K in diurnal temperature range associated with a 2.49% (95% CI: 1.86% to 3.14%) increase in daily EDVs | |||||
Victoria, Australia | Andrew et al. [23] | 2954 | YES | YES | Dropping temperature | 41.7% (95% CI: 39.6% to 43.9%) increase in ER visits due to thunderstorm | |||||
Melbourne, Australia | Thien et al. [24] | 3365 | YES | YES | YES | Plunging temperature and rising humidity | 992% increase in asthma-related EDVs |