The prevalences of allergic diseases in rural and urban areas are similar

Abstract

According to our results, atopic diseases can be considered frequent in Konya, history of atopy in the family is the most predictive factor and the effects of rural or urban factors are not obvious in atopic disease development.

Epidemiology and outcome of childhood asthma: a clinical study in an Egyptian university medical centre

“…This is not consistent with other studies [18,19]. Passive tobacco smoking and exposure to outdoor dust and smoke were significant risk factors in the prevalence of asthma but had no significant effect on the need for hospital admission in our study, whereas other studies showed that exposure to smoke increased the severity of asthma and the need for hospital admission [14,20]. These differences between our study and others may be due to the small number of cases in our study, and ‫املتوسط‬ ‫لرشق‬ ‫الصحية‬ ‫املجلة‬ ‫عرش‬ ‫التاسع‬ ‫املجلد‬ ‫السادس‬ ‫العدد‬ the small numbers hospitalized, which may have affected the likelihood of findings significant differences.…”

“…In our analysis asthma was more common among male children, which is in agreement with other studies [11,12,14]. Some studies show no significant difference between males and females [15].…”

“…Rural dwelling children were more likely to develop asthma compared with urban children in our results, while in other studies there was higher prevalence in urban children [14,17]. This can be explained by the fact that in developing countries such as Egypt environmental pollution is higher in rural regions due to factors such as smoke from agricultural burning and emissions from brick factories.…”

Prevalence of Allergic Rhinitis Among Adults in Urban and Rural Areas of China: A Population-Based Cross-Sectional Survey

“…The findings of a higher prevalence of self-reported AR in the rural area than in the urban area investigated in the present study are similar to those in Korea, the Philippines, and Turkey; however, the higher prevalence of AR in urban areas was reported in Europe and Africa as well as West Germany after reunification (Table 6). 18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25 This difference in the rural and urban areas in the present study may be due to several factors. In particular, interview response rates was lower in the rural area (75.9%) than in the urban area (81.5%), which possibly led to underreporting and underdiagnosis of AR in the rural area.…”

“…We speculated that the apparent increase was primarily due to heightened awareness of atopic diseases among the public and health care providers. In another survey from Turkey, researchers found that the risk of progression to asthma and atopic diseases was higher in families in which the paternal educational level was low and that the sensitivity and awareness of these disorders may cause the prevalence to appear higher than it was 24. A cross-sectional survey among otolaryngologists in Mainland China has recently demonstrated that while most of the otolaryngologists (61%) diagnosed AR based on medical history and nasal examination, only 35% of the otolaryngologists used skin prick tests or specific IgE serum tests 31.…”