Association of meteorological factors with paediatric intussusception in Hangzhou: an 8-year retrospective cohort study

Abstract

Objectives: This study aimed to investigate the seasonality of paediatric intussusception and the associations between meteorological factors and paediatric intussusception in Hangzhou, as well as aimed to compare the variance in sex and disease type.

Design: An 8-year retrospective study was conducted from January 2014 to December 2021 in the Children's Hospital of Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China.

Setting: This was a single-centre retrospective study review of intussusception cases in a large Children's Hospital in Hangzhou.

Participants: There were 17 674 patients with intussusception in this study.

Methods: A Spearman correlation analysis and Poisson regression analysis were used to determine the association between weekly intussusception cases and meteorological factors. The seasonality of paediatric intussusception was demonstrated via the t-test and visualised.

Result: In January, May and December, there were relatively more intussusception patients. In February, there was a trough in the number of intussusception patients. Both the Spearman correlation analysis and Poisson regression analysis proved that weekly intussusception cases had significant associations with temperature (λ=-0.205, p<0.01; β=-0.080, p<0.01), feels-like temperature (λ=-0.214, p<0.01; β=-0.012, p<0.01), dew (λ=-0.249, p<0.01; β=0.095, p<0.01), humidity (λ=-0.230, p<0.01; β=-0.037, p<0.01), precipitation (λ=-0.148, p<0.01; β=-0.001, p<0.01), windspeed (λ=-0.135, p<0.01; β=0.005, p<0.01), visibility (λ=-0.206, p<0.01; β=-0.066, p<0.01), sea level pressure (λ=0.171, p<0.01; β=-0.004, p<0.01) and a total of 20 of 25 dynamic meteorological factors (p<0.05). These associations reflected gender differences but showed stronger associations in groups that were prone to recurrence.

Conclusions: Paediatric intussusception in Hangzhou showed a seasonal tendency. Additionally, intussusception was significantly associated with certain meteorological factors in all of the cases. These findings suggest that parents and paediatricians should be more vigilant about the occurrence of intussusception in children regarding seasonal change times and climate change times.

Keywords: epidemiology; paediatric A&E and ambulatory care; paediatric gastroenterology.