Childhood bronchial asthma in a desert country

A 3 year-study of emergency room visits (total 50,300) to the paediatric clinic of the main teaching hospital in Kuwait revealed that the rates of bronchial asthmatic attacks increased significantly from 8.8% of all visits during the 1st year to 14.9% during the 3rd year. The seasonal distribution of asthmatic attacks showed maximum rates during the winter and minimum values in the summer, giving a very close inverse correlation to temperature and direct correlation to relative humidity. A similar, excellent correlation was seen between asthmatic attacks and upper respiratory infections. Occurrence of atmospheric pollen, which characteristically shows a bi-annual pattern i Kuwait, was not found to correlate with asthma attack rates. Neither was there any demonstrable effect of dust storms on the frequency of asthmatic attacks in the children. Independent of season, the boy to girl ratio among the asthma cases was remarkably constant, around 2:1.