Geographies of asthma medication purchase for pre-schoolers in Belgium

Trabelsi, Sonia; Casas, Lidia; Nemery, Benoît; Nawrot, Tim S.; Thomas, Isabelle

doi:10.1186/s12931-019-1052-8

Cited by 7 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 35 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…1.43, 95% CI: 1.10-1.85) with interquartile range increase in NDVI within 100 m of the residence in preschool children in Lithuania. A similar study in preschool children in Belgium also found an association between the prevalence of asthma medication sales and the relative cover of green space derived from CLC data (Trabelsi et al 2019).…”

Section: Comparison With Other Studiesmentioning

confidence: 55%

“…The observed inverse association may be the result of ecological bias or confounding by an unmeasured variable, such as medical practice, resulting in lower medication sales for childhood asthma in areas with a higher burden of air pollution. Such confounding has been documented before in Belgium, where strong cultural contrasts exist between the different regions (Trabelsi et al 2019).…”

Section: Comparison With Other Studiesmentioning

confidence: 61%

“…Health effects of green space observed at individual level may not be observed at aggregated level (census tract level). Also, individual socio-economic status differences, such as lifestyle, affluence, or general practitioner's prescription patterns, may impact associations between green space and medication sales (Trabelsi et al 2019;Aerts et al 2020) and these effects are masked in aggregated data; 2. The OAD medication sales period prevalence may differ from the actual prevalence of childhood asthma, because it is unlikely that all asthma patients are diagnosed and recorded in the IMA-AIM database.…”

Section: Strengths and Limitationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Residential green space and medication sales for childhood asthma: A longitudinal ecological study in Belgium

Aerts

Dujardin

Nemery

et al. 2020

Environmental Research

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Background: Living in green environments has been associated with various health benefits, but the evidence for positive effects on respiratory health in children is ambiguous.Objective: To investigate if residential exposure to different types of green space is associated with childhood asthma prevalence in Belgium.Methods: Asthma prevalence was estimated from sales data of reimbursed medication for obstructive airway disease (OAD) prescribed to children between 2010 and 2014, aggregated at census tract level (n = 1872) by sex and age group (6-12 and 13-18 years). Generalized log-linear mixed effects models with repeated measures were used to estimate effects of relative covers of forest, grassland and garden in the census tract of the residence on OAD medication sales. Models were adjusted for air pollution (PM10), housing quality and administrative region.Results: Consistent associations between OAD medication sales and relative covers of grassland and garden were observed (unadjusted parameter estimates per IQR increase of relative cover, range across four strata: grassland, β = 0.15-0.17; garden, β = 0.13-0.17). The associations remained significant after adjusting for housing quality and chronic air pollution (adjusted parameter estimates per IQR increase of relative cover, range across four strata: grassland, β = 0.10-0.14; garden, β = 0.07-0.09). There was no association between OAD medication sales and forest cover.Conclusions: Based on aggregated data, we found that living in close proximity to areas with high grass cover (grasslands, but also residential gardens) may negatively impact child respiratory health. Potential allergic and non-allergic mechanisms that underlie this association include elevated exposure to grass pollen and fungi and reduced exposure to environmental biodiversity. Reducing the dominance of grass in public and private green

show abstract

Section: Comparison With Other Studiesmentioning

confidence: 55%

Section: Comparison With Other Studiesmentioning

confidence: 61%

Section: Strengths and Limitationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Residential green space and medication sales for childhood asthma: A longitudinal ecological study in Belgium

Aerts

Dujardin

Nemery

et al. 2020

Environmental Research

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Belgium (11.43 million inhabitants in 2019;30,528 km²) has three administrative regions: the Flemish Region (Flanders, 13,522 km²), the Walloon Region (Wallonia, 16,844 km²) and the Brussels Capital Region (161 km²). The Flemish Region in the north is generally characterized by a dense network of cities and roads, high densities of population, industrial activities and traffic, and, consequently, high levels of air pollution and highly fragmented green spaces (Supplementary material Maps S1-S4) (Trabelsi et al 2019). The landscape in the Walloon Region in the south is less densely populated and more green, except along the former industrial backbone in the Sambre and Meuse valley.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Residential green space, air pollution, socioeconomic deprivation and cardiovascular medication sales in Belgium: A nationwide ecological study

Aerts

Nemery

Bauwelinck

et al. 2020

Science of The Total Environment

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Green space may improve cardiovascular (CV) health, for example by promoting physical activity and by reducing air pollution, noise and heat. Socioeconomic and environmental factors may modify the health effects of green space. We examined the association between residential green space and reimbursed CV medication sales in Belgium between 2006 and 2014, adjusting for socioeconomic deprivation and air pollution. We analyzed data for 11,575 census tracts using structural equation models for the entire country and for the administrative regions. Latent variables for green space, air pollution and socioeconomic deprivation were used as predictors of CV medication sales and were estimated from the number of patches of forest, census tract relative forest cover and relative forest cover within a 600 m buffer around the census tract; annual mean concentrations of PM2.5, BC and NO2; and percentages of inhabitants that were foreign-born from lower-and mid-income countries, unemployed or had no higher education. A direct association between socioeconomic deprivation and CV medication sales [parameter estimate (95% CI): 0.26 (0.25; 0.28)] and inverse associations between CV medication sales and green space [-0.71 (-0.80; -0.61)] and air pollution [-1.62 (-1.69; -0.61)] were observed. In the regional models, the association between green space and CV medication sales was stronger in the region with relatively low green space cover (Flemish Region, standardized estimate -0.16) than in the region with high green space cover (Walloon Region, -0.10). In the highly urbanized Brussels Capital Region the association tended towards the null. In all regions, the associations between CV medication sales and socioeconomic deprivation were direct and more prominent. Our results suggest that there may be an inverse association between green space and CV medication sales, but socioeconomic deprivation was always the strongest predictor of CV medication sales.

show abstract

“…From either side of the linguistic border, each Region present its own characteristics, density of companies, rate of urbanisation, etc. (Goffette-Nagot et al, 2011;Helgers and Buyst, 2016;Persyn and Torfs, 2016;Thomas et al, 2017;Trabelsi et al, 2019). The BCR administrative limits are no longer relevant boundaries of Brussels, as the morphological and functional extents of Brussels sprawl widely out in the Flemish and Walloon Regions (Riguelle et al, 2007;Poelmans and Van Rompaey, 2009;Thomas et al, 2012;Adam et al, 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Monitoring trucks to reveal Belgian geographical structures and dynamics: From GPS traces to spatial interactions

Adam

Finance

Thomas

2021

Journal of Transport Geography

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Despite the fact that freight transport has a huge impact on the economy and the environment, datasets have always been scarce or restricted to very small a-spatial samples. We here aim at diverting spatial data collected in Belgium for tolling trucks proportionally of their use of the road network, and at further extracting geographical structures and dynamics out of this massive dataset. The paper first relates to the numerous problems encountered when using and transforming big data generated by On Board Units GNSS (cleaning, transforming and preprocessing), second it maps and comments movements (traffic) and stops of trucks within the entire country, and finally partitions the country into mathematical communities of places that most interact. Analyses are performed for the complete sample, but also for sub-categories based on the country of registration underlining the spatial specificities of freight transit in Belgium. This exploratory spatial data analysis enables to reveal multi-level spatial structures associated to urban hierarchies, transport infrastructure but also firm locations or political organizations, tickling the complexity and interconnectivity of any measure taken for a more sustainable future.

show abstract

Geographies of asthma medication purchase for pre-schoolers in Belgium

Cited by 7 publications

References 35 publications

Residential green space and medication sales for childhood asthma: A longitudinal ecological study in Belgium

Residential green space and medication sales for childhood asthma: A longitudinal ecological study in Belgium

Residential green space, air pollution, socioeconomic deprivation and cardiovascular medication sales in Belgium: A nationwide ecological study

Monitoring trucks to reveal Belgian geographical structures and dynamics: From GPS traces to spatial interactions

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About