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Impact of Hurricane Exposure on Reproductive Health Outcomes, Florida, 2004

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 January 2017

Shannon C. Grabich ,
Whitney R. Robinson ,
Charles E. Konrad  and
Jennifer A. Horney
Shannon C. Grabich*
Affiliation:
Department of Epidemiology, UNC Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina
Whitney R. Robinson
Affiliation:
Department of Epidemiology, UNC Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina
Charles E. Konrad
Affiliation:
Department of Geography, UNC Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina
Jennifer A. Horney
Affiliation:
Department of Epidemiology, UNC Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Texas A&M Health Science Center, College Station, Texas
*
Correspondence and reprint requests to Shannon Colleen Grabich, PhD, UNC Chapel Hill, Department of Epidemiology, 409 Loblolly Dr, Durham, NC 27712 (e-mail: sgrabich@email.unc.edu).
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Abstract

Objective

Prenatal hurricane exposure may be an increasingly important contributor to poor reproductive health outcomes. In the current literature, mixed associations have been suggested between hurricane exposure and reproductive health outcomes. This may be due, in part, to residual confounding. We assessed the association between hurricane exposure and reproductive health outcomes by using a difference-in-difference analysis technique to control for confounding in a cohort of Florida pregnancies.

Methods

We implemented a difference-in-difference analysis to evaluate hurricane weather and reproductive health outcomes including low birth weight, fetal death, and birth rate. The study population for analysis included all Florida pregnancies conceived before or during the 2003 and 2004 hurricane season. Reproductive health data were extracted from vital statistics records from the Florida Department of Health. In 2004, 4 hurricanes (Charley, Frances, Ivan, and Jeanne) made landfall in rapid succession; whereas in 2003, no hurricanes made landfall in Florida.

Results

Overall models using the difference-in-difference analysis showed no association between exposure to hurricane weather and reproductive health.

Conclusions

The inconsistency of the literature on hurricane exposure and reproductive health may be in part due to biases inherent in pre-post or regression-based county-level comparisons. We found no associations between hurricane exposure and reproductive health. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2017;11:407–411)

Keywords

disastersepidemiologic methodshurricanepublic healthvital statistics
Type
Brief Reports
Information
Disaster Medicine and Public Health Preparedness , Volume 11 , Issue 4 , August 2017 , pp. 407 - 411
Copyright
Copyright © Society for Disaster Medicine and Public Health, Inc. 2017 

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