An association between air pollution and daily most frequently visits of eighteen outpatient diseases in an industrial city

Abstract

AbstractToxic effects of air pollutants were individually identified in various organs of the body. However, the concurrent occurrences and the connection of diseases in multiple organs arise from air pollution has not been concurrently studied before. Here we hypothesize that there exist connected health effects arise from air pollution when diseases in various organs were considered together. We used medical data from hospital outpatient visits for various organs in the body with a disease-air pollution model that represents each of the diseases as a function of the environmental factors. Our results show that elevated air pollution risks (above 40%) concurrently occurred in diseases of spondylosis, cerebrovascular, pneumonia, accidents, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), influenza, osteoarthritis (OA), asthma, peptic ulcer disease (PUD), cancer, heart, hypertensive, diabetes, kidney, and rheumatism. Air pollutants that were associated with elevated health risks are particular matters with diameters equal or less than 2.5 μm (PM2.5), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), ozone (O3), particular matters with diameters equal or less than 10 μm (PM10), carbon monoxide (CO), and nitrogen oxide (NO). Concurrent occurrences of diseases in various organs indicate that the immune system tries to connectively defend the body from persistent and rising air pollution.