Association between ambient temperature and chronic rhinosinusitis

Background: Chronic exposure to particulate matter air pollution (PM_2.5) is associated with chronic rhinosinusitis (CRS). Elevated ambient temperature may increase PM_2.5 levels and thereby exacerbate sinonasal symptoms. This study investigates the association between high ambient temperature and the risk of CRS diagnosis. Methods: Patients with CRS were diagnosed at Johns Hopkins hospitals from May to October 2013–2022, and controls were matched patients without CRS meanwhile. A total of 4752 patients (2376 cases and 2376 controls) were identified with a mean (SD) age of 51.8 (16.8) years. The effect of maximum ambient temperature on symptoms was estimated with a distributed lag nonlinear model (DLNM). Extreme heat was defined as 35.0°C (95^th percentile of the maximum temperature distribution). Conditional logistic regression models estimated the association between extreme heat and the risk of CRS diagnosis. Results: Exposure to extreme heat was associated with increased odds of exacerbation of CRS symptoms (odds ratio [OR] 1.11, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.03–1.19). The cumulative effect of extreme heat during 0–21 lag days was significant (OR 2.37, 95% CI 1.60–3.50) compared with the minimum morbidity temperature (MMT) at 25.3°C. Associations were more pronounced among young and middle-aged patients and patients with abnormal weight. Conclusions: We found that short-term exposure to high ambient temperature is associated with increased CRS diagnosis, suggesting a cascading effect of meteorological phenomena. These results highlight climate change's potentially deleterious health effects on upper airway diseases, which could have a significant public health impact.