반려동물과 아동의 천식증상과의 관계에 관한 연구 - 반려견 및 반려묘를 중심으로 -

Association between Pets and Asthma Symptoms in Korean Children - Focusing on Dogs and Cats -

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to assess the association between pet ownership and asthma symptoms in Korean children. Methods: This study used data from the 8th Panel Study on Korean Children in 2015. For the final study, 1598 cases were used. Wheezing as an asthma symptom was self-reported as an outcome variable. Whether children had owned dogs or cats or not was used as an independent variable. Results: A total of 6.8% of children lived with dogs and 2.1% of children lived with cats in their homes. There were 4.0% of children who had asthma symptoms in the past year. When comparing ‘children who had owned dogs for more than 12 months’ with ‘children who had not owned dogs’, the adjusted odds ratio (OR) for ‘asthma symptoms’ were 1.20 (95% confidence interval (CI), 1.10-1.30) among male children and 2.19 (95% CI, 1.94-2.46) among female children. When comparing ‘children who had owned cats for more than 12 months’ with ‘children who had not owned cats’, the adjusted ORs for ‘asthma symptoms’ were 38.94 (95% CI, 35.55-42.65) among male children and 5.32 (95% CI, 4.60-6.16) among female children. When comparing ‘children who had owned both dogs and cats for more than 12 months’ with ‘children who had not owned at all’, the adjusted OR for ‘asthma symptoms’ was 13.22 (95% CI, 11.93-14.65), and when comparing ‘children who had owned cats only’ with ‘children who had not owned at all’, the adjusted OR for ‘asthma symptoms’ was 9.25 (95% CI, 8.50-10.08). Conclusions: As a result, children s asthma symptoms were higher in the case of cats than with dogs, and in the case of cats, boys were more at risk than girls. In the analysis for the risk of asthma symptoms when a dog and a cat are raised at the same time, it was statistically confirmed that the children in the home were more at risk than with single animal ownership. The results of this study can be considered to be of great importance in policy-making and for the use of educational materials in the field of environmental health.