Association of Temperature and Humidity with Trauma Deaths

BACKGROUND: Few studies worldwide have shown that climate factors such as temperature and humidity may contribute to injuries and sudden death. However, to the best of our knowledge no studies have been conducted on climate and traumatic deaths in Iran. OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between temperature and humidity and trauma deaths in Kerman, Iran. MATERIALS AND MATERIALS: In this study, data of all trauma deaths from March 2006 to February 2011 were collected from the Kerman Health Ministry and categorized by causes. Trauma deaths were extracted and matched with data regarding temperature and humidity obtained from the Kerman Meteorology Office during the same time period. Negative binomial regression and Spearman correlation analysis were used to analyze the data using STATA10 and MiniTab16. RESULTS: The findings of this study showed that the overall mortality caused by trauma is higher in the warm season. The highest correlation between mortality and temperature was seen in ages over 60 years (r = 0.301, P = 0.020) in trauma deaths and was statistically significant. An inverse significant correlation was observed between the incidence of trauma deaths and humidity and was highest in the over 60-year age group (r = -0.336, P = 0.009). The regression results also revealed an inverse significant relationship between humidity and trauma deaths in the over 60-year age group. CONCLUSIONS: High temperatures and low humidity increased the risk of trauma deaths in our study. However, more studies are needed to document this.