Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Difference of performance in response to disease admissions between daily time air quality indices and those derived from average and entropy functions

  • Research Article
  • Published:
Environmental Science and Pollution Research Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Daily time air quality indices, which can reflect air quality in 1 day, are suitable for identifying daily exposure during conditions of poor air quality. The aim of this study is to compare the main effectiveness of four daily time indices in representing variation in the number of disease admissions. These indices include pollution standard index (PSI), air quality index (AQI) and their respective indices derived from mean and entropy functions: MEPSI and MEAQI. The hourly concentrations of fine particulate matter less than 10 μm in diameter (PM10), PM2.5, O3, CO, NO2 and SO2 from 1 January 2006 to 31 December 2010 were obtained from 14 air quality monitoring stations owned by the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) in the Kaoping region, Taiwan.

Instead of circulatory system disease admissions, the indices were correlative with the number of respiratory disease admissions with correlative coefficients of 0.49 to 0.56 (P < 0.05). The daily time air quality indices derived from mean and entropy functions improved their performance of reactive range and air pollution identification. The reactive range of MEPSI and MEAQI was 1.4–3 times that of the original indices. The MEPSI and MEAQI increased identification from 40 to 180 in index scale and revealed one to two additional categories of public health effect information. In comparison with other indices, MEAQI is more effective for application to pollution events with multiple air pollutants.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Abelsohn A, Stieb DM (2011) Health effects of outdoor air pollution: approach to counseling patients using the air quality health index. Can Fam Phys 57(8):881–887

    Google Scholar 

  • AirNow (2014) About AirNow http://www.airnow.gov/index.cfm?action=topics.about_airnow. Accessed 24 September 2015

  • Allison PD (1999) Logistic regression using the SAS system: theory and application. SAS Institute, Cary, p 288

    Google Scholar 

  • Bureau of National Health Insurance (BNHI) (2009) Beneficiaries by Beneficiary Category, The National Health Insurance Statistics. http://www.nhi.gov.tw/English/webdata/webdata.aspx?menu=11&menu_id=296&WD_ID=296&webdata_id=3420. Accessed 29 August 2012

  • Chen W, Wang FS, Xiao GF, Wu K, Zhang SX (2015a) Air quality of Beijing and impacts of the new ambient air quality standard. Atmosphere 6(8):1243–1258

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chen W, Yan L, Zhao HM (2015b) Seasonal variations of atmospheric pollution and air quality in Beijing. Atmosphere 6(11):1753–1770

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Cheng WL, Kuo YC, Lin PL et al (2004) Revised air quality index derived from an entropy function. Atmos Environ 38(3):383–391

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Cheng WL, Chen YS, Zhang J et al (2007) Comparison of the revised air quality index with the PSI and AQI indices. Sci Total Environ 382(2–3):191–198

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Dye C, Boerma T, Evans D et al (2014) The world health report 2013: research for universal health coverage. World Health Organization (WHO): Geneva, Switzerland

  • Fang SH, Chen HW (1996) Air quality and pollution control in Taiwan. Atmos Environ 30(5):735–741

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Hu J, Ying Q, Wang Y, Zhang H (2015) Characterizing multi-pollutant air pollution in China: comparison of three air quality indices. Environ Int 84:17–25

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Kanchan K, Gorai AK, Goyal P (2015) A review on air quality indexing system. Asian J Atmos Environ 9-2:101–113

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Liu CM (2002) Effect of PM2.5 on AQI in Taiwan. Environ Model Softw 17(1):29–37

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Liu CM, Young CY, Lee YC (2006) Influence of Asian dust storms on air quality in Taiwan. Sci Total Environ 368(2–3):884–897

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • McClave JT, Sincich T (2003) Statistics 9th Ed. Prentice-Hall Inc. Upper Saddle River, NJ

  • Nasir UP, Brahmaiah D (2015) Impact of fireworks on ambient air quality: a case study. Int J Environ Sci Te 12(4):1379–1386

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Swamee PK, Tyagi A (1999) Formation of an air pollution index. J Air Waste Manage Assoc 49:88–91

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Taiwan Environmental Protection Administration (Taiwan EPA) (2014) Air Quality Annual Report of R.O.C. (Taiwan). Taiwan EPA: Taipei

  • Taiwan Environmental Protection Administration (Taiwan EPA) (2015) Real time air pollution index http://taqm.epa.gov.tw/taqm/en/b0203.aspx. Accessed 26 January 2016

  • United States Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) (1999) Air quality reporting. Fed Regist 64(149):42530–42549

    Google Scholar 

  • United States Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) (2003) Air Quality Index A Guide to Air Quality and Your Health

  • United States Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) (2013) Technical Assistance Document for the Reporting of Daily Air Quality—the Air Quality Index (AQI) http://www3.epa.gov/airnow/aqi-technical-assistance-document-dec2013.pdf. Accessed 3 February 2015

  • Van den Elshout S, Leger K, Heich H (2014) CAQI common air quality index—update with PM2.5 and sensitivity analysis. Sci Total Environ 488:463–470

    Google Scholar 

  • Wark RM, Wong KFV (1999) Methodologies for incorporation of synergistic effects in the calculation of the pollutant standards index. Int J Environ Pollut 12(1):81–90

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Yeh KW, Chang CJ, Huang JL (2011) The association of seasonal variations of asthma hospitalization with air pollution among children in Taiwan. Asian Pac J Allergy Immunol 29(1):34–41

    Google Scholar 

  • Ziegler AD, Terry JP, Oliver GJH, Friess DA, Chuah CJ, Chow WTL, Wasson RJ (2014) Increasing Singapore’s resilience to drought. Hydrol Process 28(15):4543–4548

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful to the Taiwan Environmental Protection Administration (Taiwan EPA) for providing meteorological data and information on air pollutant concentrations. This study made use of data from the National Health Insurance Research Database, which was provided by the Bureau of National Health Insurance and the Department of Health and managed by the National Health Research Institutes (Registered No. NHIRD-99-317, NHIRD-100-300 and NHIRD-102-012). The interpretation and conclusions contained herein do not represent the opinions or influence of the Bureau of National Health Insurance, Department of Health or National Health Research Institutes.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for General Education, National Taipei University of Business, No. 321, Sec 1, Chi-Nan Rd., Taipei, 10051, Taiwan, Republic of China

    Li-Wei Lai

  2. Department of Environmental Management, Taiwan Institute of Development Strategy, Taichung, Taiwan, Republic of China

    Wan-Li Cheng

Authors
  1. Li-Wei Lai
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Wan-Li Cheng
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Li-Wei Lai.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Responsible editor: Philippe Garrigues

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Lai, LW., Cheng, WL. Difference of performance in response to disease admissions between daily time air quality indices and those derived from average and entropy functions. Environ Sci Pollut Res 24, 14924–14933 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-017-9133-z

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-017-9133-z

Keywords

Search

Navigation