Key result
Hand-foot-mouth disease exhibited significant spatiotemporal clustering in Zibo city, with the main cluster located in Zhangdian District having an incidence risk 2.41 times higher than outside areas.
Why the study?
Hand-foot-mouth disease is a major public health threat to children under 5 years old in China, and early recognition of high-risk districts and epidemic characteristics is needed to effectively facilitate prevention.
Observational (n=52,095)
Relative Risk: 2.41
p-value: p=<0.001
HFMD in Zibo city shows significant spatiotemporal clustering, particularly in central districts and among children under 5, highlighting areas for targeted public health interventions.
BACKGROUND: Hand-foot-mouth disease (HFMD) is a global public health issues, especially in China. It has threat the health of children under 5 years old. The early recognition of high-risk districts and understanding of epidemic characteristics can facilitate health sectors to prevent the occurrence of HFMD effectively. METHODS: Descriptive analysis was used to summarize epidemic characteristics, and the spatial autocorrelation analysis and space-time scan analysis were utilized to explore distribution pattern of HFMD and identify hot spots with statistical significance. The result was presented in ArcMap. RESULTS: A total of 52,095 HFMD cases were collected in Zibo city from 1 Jan 2010 to 31 Dec 2019. The annual average incidence was 129.72/100,000. The distribution of HFMD was a unimodal trend, with peak from April to September. The most susceptible age group was children under 5 years old (92.46%), and the male-to-female ratio is 1.60: 1. The main clusters were identified in Zhangdian District from 12 April 2010 to 18 September 2012. Spatial autocorrelation analysis showed that the global spatial correlation in Zibo were no statistical significance, except in 2012, 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2018. Cold spots were gathered in Boshan county and Linzi district, while hot spots only in Zhangdian District in 2018, but other years were no significance. CONCLUSION: Hot spots mainly concentrated in the central and surrounding city of Zibo city. We suggest that imminent public health planning and resource allocation should be focused within those areas.
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Liu et al. (2021) conducted an observational in Hand-foot-mouth disease (n=52,095). Spatiotemporal clustering (Main cluster in Zhangdian District) vs. Outside the cluster area was evaluated on Relative risk of HFMD incidence inside the main spatiotemporal cluster compared to outside (RR 2.41, p=<0.001). Hand-foot-mouth disease exhibited significant spatiotemporal clustering in Zibo city, with the main cluster located in Zhangdian District having an incidence risk 2.41 times higher than outside areas.
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