Vulnerabilities to Temperature Effects on Acute Myocardial Infarction Hospital Admissions in South Korea

Abstract

Most previous studies have focused on the association between acute myocardial function (AMI) and temperature by gender and age. Recently, however, concern has also arisen about those most susceptible to the effects of temperature according to socioeconomic status (SES). The objective of this study was to determine the effect of heat and cold on hospital admissions for AMI by subpopulations (gender, age, living area, and individual SES) in South Korea. The Korea National Health Insurance (KNHI) database was used to examine the effect of heat and cold on hospital admissions for AMI during 2004–2012. We analyzed the increase in AMI hospital admissions both above and below a threshold temperature using Poisson generalized additive models (GAMs) for hot, cold, and warm weather. The Medicaid group, the lowest SES group, had a significantly higher RR of 1.37 (95% CI: 1.07–1.76) for heat and 1.11 (95% CI: 1.04–1.20) for cold among subgroups, while also showing distinctly higher risk curves than NHI for both hot and cold weather. In additions, females, older age group, and those living in urban areas had higher risks from hot and cold temperatures than males, younger age group, and those living in rural areas.

Impact of Temperature Variation on Acute Myocardial Infarction in Karachi, Pakistan

“…A direct comparison of our study finding with previous studies is difficult owing to the differences and inconsistencies in the study design and statistical methods. On an aggregate level, we observed the same relationship between temperature and AMI, along with with the same seasonal variations, as the studies conducted in the past [5,[9][10][11][12][13][14][18][19][20]. Among other metrological variables, temperature variations have a profound and consistent impact on the incidence of AMI, not only in its extreme states (both high and low) but also transient change in temperature can trigger acute myocardial infarction (AMI) [5].…”

“…Traditionally AMI is considered a disease of hot and humid weather. Moreover, in the past few decades, environmental triggers of AMI have gained mounting evidence from various geographies of the world [5,[7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14]. Low temperature or cold weather was found to be a convincing risk factor for the incidence of AMI [5,7].…”

Decrease in mortality rate and hospital admissions for acute myocardial infarction after the enactment of the smoking ban law in São Paulo city, Brazil

“…Regarding environmental variables, temperature variations are implicated with the occurrence of myocardial infarction 39 40. In our study, we used the pollutant and environmental data to estimate models using ARIMAX method and since the variations of air pollutants are related themselves, we opted for using that one which provided the best prediction of events and that has biological plausibility with cardiovascular diseases.…”

Morbidität durch Hitze – eine Analyse der Krankenhauseinweisungen per Rettungseinsatz während einer Hitzewelle 2015 in Frankfurt/Main

“…Es zeigte sich ein relatives Risiko von 1,37 in den Sommermonaten. Dieser Effekt war stärker ausgeprägt bei Frauen, im fortgeschrittenen Alter und bei niedrigem sozio-ökonomischen Status [14].…”

“…Insgesamt stammen viele Studien zu Hitzewellen oder Hitzebedingten gesundheitlichen Problemen aus Gebieten mit tropischem oder subtropischem Klima: Korea [14], Vietnam [15], Texas/ USA [16], Spanien und Italien [17,18] sowie Australien [19,20]. Wenige Studien existieren zur Hitze-bedingten Morbidität und Mortalität in gemäßigtem Klima [4,[21][22][23].…”