Heat Metrics and Maternal-Child Health Diagnoses in Emergency Departments in the United States: A Scoping Review

To summarize current research on associations between heat metrics and emergency department discharge diagnoses for US pregnant women and children from birth to age 18 via a scoping review.

Climate change directly contributes to extreme weather conditions and environmental changes and indirectly affects health and the health care system. Pregnant women and children are believed to be more susceptible to extreme heat, but few empirical studies have been conducted evaluating effects of heat metrics on these populations.

Ovid MEDLINE, CIHAHL, SCOPUS, Web of Science, JSTOR, and PsycINFO databases were searched using a combination of key words.

Twelve studies were selected for this review. In pregnant women, positive associations were found between mean daily temperature and multiple subtypes of pregnancy complications, including threatened or spontaneous abortion, renal diseases, infectious diseases, diabetes, and hypertension. In children, positive associations were found with all-cause diagnoses; asthma; dehydration; electrolyte disorders; heat-related illness; infection; endocrine, nutritional, and metabolic diseases; injury; and otitis media and external emergency department discharge diagnoses and temperature or heatwave versus non-heatwave.

By tracking associations between maternal-child emergency department discharge diagnoses and various heat metrics, researchers can contribute to better clinical practices that promote environmental justice and climate resilience.