The association between daily concentrations of air pollution and visits to a psychiatric emergency unit: a case-crossover study

BACKGROUND: Air pollution is one of the leading causes of mortality and morbidity worldwide. Experimental studies, and a few epidemiological studies, suggest that air pollution may cause acute exacerbation of psychiatric disorders, and even increase the rate of suicide attempts, but epidemiological studies on air pollution in association with psychiatric disorders are still few. Our aim was to investigate associations between daily fluctuations in air pollution concentrations and the daily number of visits to a psychiatric emergency unit. METHODS: Data from Sahlgrenska University Hospital, Gothenburg, Sweden, on the daily number of visits to the Psychiatric emergency unit were combined with daily data on monitored concentrations of respirable particulate matter(PM(10)), ozone(O(3)), nitrogen dioxides(NO(2)) and temperature between 1st July 2012 and 31st December 2016. We used a case-crossover design to analyze data with conditional Poisson regression models allowing for over-dispersion. We stratified data on season. RESULTS: Visits increased with increasing PM(10) levels during the warmer season (April to September) in both single-pollutant and two-pollutant models. For example, an increase of 3.6% (95% Confidence Interval, CI, 0.4–7.0%) was observed with a 10 μg/m3 increase in PM(10) adjusted for NO(2). In the three-pollutant models (adjusting for NO(2) and O(3) simultaneously) the increase was 3.3% (95% CI, −0.2-6.9). There were no clear associations between the outcome and NO(2), O(3), or PM(10) during the colder season (October to March). CONCLUSIONS: Ambient air particle concentrations were associated with the number of visits to the Psychiatric emergency unit in the warm season. The results were only borderline statistically significant in the fully adjusted (three-pollutant) models in this small study. The observation could be interpreted as indicative of air pollution as either exacerbating an underlying psychiatric disorder, or increasing mental distress, even in areas with comparatively low levels of air pollution. In combination with the severe impact of psychiatric disorders and mental distress on society and individuals, our results are a strong warrant for future research in this area. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s12940-017-0348-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.