Effects of Meteorological Factors on Hospitalizations in Adult Patients with Asthma: A Systematic Review

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
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, )
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%, )
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