Associations of short-term ambient temperature exposure with lung function in middle-aged and elderly people: A longitudinal study in China

Weihong Qiu; Bin Wang; Xiaobing Feng; Heng He; Lieyang Fan; Zi Ye; Xiuquan Nie; Ge Mu; Wei Liu; Dongming Wang; Min Zhou; Weihong Chen

doi:10.1016/j.eehl.2024.01.008

Associations of short-term ambient temperature exposure with lung function in middle-aged and elderly people: A longitudinal study in China

Eco Environ Health. 2024 Feb 10;3(2):165-173. doi: 10.1016/j.eehl.2024.01.008. eCollection 2024 Jun.

Authors

Weihong Qiu^{1

2}, Bin Wang¹, Xiaobing Feng¹, Heng He², Lieyang Fan¹, Zi Ye¹, Xiuquan Nie¹, Ge Mu¹, Wei Liu¹, Dongming Wang¹, Min Zhou¹, Weihong Chen¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Occupational and Environmental Health, School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430030, China.
² Department of Epidemiology and Health Statistics, School of Public Health, Fujian Medical University, Fuzhou 350122, China.

Abstract

The short-term associations of ambient temperature exposure with lung function in middle-aged and elderly Chinese remain obscure. The study included 19,128 participants from the Dongfeng-Tongji cohort's first (2013) and second (2018) follow-ups. The lung function for each subject was determined between April and December 2013 and re-assessed in 2018, with three parameters (forced vital capacity [FVC], forced expiratory volume in 1 s [FEV₁], and peak expiratory flow [PEF]) selected. The China Meteorological Data Sharing Service Center provided temperature data during the study period. In the two follow-ups, a total of 25,511 records (average age: first, 64.57; second, 65.80) were evaluated, including 10,604 males (41.57%). The inversely J-shaped associations between moving average temperatures (lag01-lag07) and FVC, FEV₁, and PEF were observed, and the optimum temperatures at lag04 were 16.5 °C, 18.7 °C, and 16.2 °C, respectively. At lag04, every 1 °C increase in temperature was associated with 14.07 mL, 9.78 mL, and 62.72 mL/s increase in FVC, FEV₁, and PEF in the low-temperature zone (<the optimum temperatures), whereas 5.72 mL, 2.01 mL, and 11.64 mL/s decrease in the high-temperature zone (≥the optimum temperatures), respectively (all P < 0.05). We observed significant effect modifications of gender, age, body mass index, body surface area, smoking status, drinking status, and physical activity on the associations (all P_modification < 0.05). Non-optimal temperatures may cause lung function decline. Several individual characters and lifestyles have effect modification on the temperature effects.

Keywords: Ambient temperature; Generalized additive mixed model; Linear mixed-effects model; Lung function; Middle-aged and elderly people; Vulnerable groups.