This study evaluates the associations between cause-specific mortality for a wide spectrum of diseases (which includes both diseases that are ICD-coded as heat/cold-related and diseases that are not coded as heat/cold related) and weather characteristics such as temperature, humidity, wind, and air pollution.
These associations will be analyzed by age, sex, and race for three U.S. states at the county level: North Carolina, California, and New York. The evidence of time trends in evaluated effects will be investigated over four decades of observation. Analyses will include the regression analyses, time-series analyses, and evaluation of the lag period for effects of temperature on cause-specific mortality, and the estimation of the thresholds for the high and low temperatures effects on mortality for each studied state. The comprehensive model of association of cause-specific mortality and temperature patterns will be developed.
Igor Akushevich
Julia Krauchanka