Erratum: Synergistic Association of House Endotoxin Exposure and Ambient Air Pollution with Asthma Outcomes

The authors have recently discovered errors in the article by Mendy and colleagues (1), published in the September 15, 2019 issue of the Journal. The authors informed the Journal that the spatiotemporal data in their article were linked incorrectly. This incorrect data linkage was the result of participant locations based on a list of census tracts from the year 2000 being inadvertently matched against air pollution readings based on a list of census tracts from the year 2010 (rather than the year 2000). This mismatch of years resulted in 475 participants not being matched to air pollution data, and thus being excluded from the analysis. The authors additionally state that it is possible that an unknown number of participants could have been matched to air pollution data at a different location than their actual residence. The correction of this incorrect linkage using 2000 census data instead of 2010 resulted in all 475 previously excluded participants being reintroduced to the analysis and the presumed correction of previously mismatched locations. The corrected dataset contained a higher proportion of participants from the Western region (31.0% vs. 25.9%) and a higher proportion of participants living in nonmetro areas (49.2% vs. 45.6%).

The authors believe that all other outcome and covariate distributions changed minimally, suggesting they had been missing at random due to the incorrect data linkage and that the revised data do not change the overall findings and conclusions. However, there have been extensive changes to the data listed in Tables 1, 2, and 3; Figures 1 and 2; and all the tables in the online supplement associated with the article. Therefore, the Journal is replacing the online version of the article with a corrected version. In addition, a document showing all the changes to the data will be posted as an online supplement to the original article.

The authors would like to apologize to the readership for any confusion caused by these errors.