Abstract
1.Objective: To assess the short-term effects of air pollution on the sale of anti-allergy drugs, both prescribed and over the count as a proxy of disease activity, in metropolitan France in 2013 at the departmental level.2.Methods: We carried out a descriptive analysis of the distribution of drug sales for the Anatomical Therapeutic Chemical (ATC) classification system R06 (Antihistamines for systemic use), as well as the distribution of major air pollutants, namely Particulate Matter with a diameter of 2.5 micrometers or less (PM2.5), Particulate Matter with a diameter of 10 micrometers or less (PM10) and Nitrogen dioxide (NO2). A Quasi-Poisson regression with a generalized additive model (GAM) was performed to estimate the short-term relationship between air pollution and drug sales. Unadjusted and adjusted single-pollutant models were generated, as well as bipollutant models. Relative risks, crude or adjusted, and 95% Confidence Interval were estimated from these models.3.Results: NO2 and PM10 were significantly positively associated with drug sales for the R06 therapeutic class, in the adjusted model with one pollutant (RRa = 1.034 (95% IC = 1.028-1.039) and (RRa = 1.043 (95% IC = 1.034-1.051) respectively). NO2 and PM10 remained significantly positively associated with anti-allergic medication sales in bipollutant models. No significant relationship was found for PM2.5.4.Conclusions: Our study confirms the presence of a short-term association between NO2, and PM10 and the sale of anti-allergy drugs thus confirming previous observations on the impact of air pollution on allergies activity. Further studies on larger databases and over several years are necessary to better understand these results.