Study of correlation between the geographical distribution of Budd-Chiari syndrome with iodine content in drinking water

Objective To discover the relationship between iodine content of drinking water and morbidity of Budd-Chiari syndrome.Methods 342 cases of BCS, whose addresses were found to be from Heze area of Shandong province in China, were randomly selected from five hospitals including Heze Municipal Hospital during the year 1995 to 2004.Considering the gender and age and iodine content of drinking water, we established a map of spatial distribution of patients in Heze area and studied the relationship between iodine content of potable water and BCS using the spatial statistical analysis, based on the median iodine of various townships of Heze in Shandong province in 2003.Then the morbidity of BCS in heze area was counted and linear correlation analysis of the median of the morbidity and iodine content of drinking water was performed, .which was based on the population data from 2000 Population Census in China.Results The ratio of male to female was 1.71:1, and the average age of patients was 40.30±12.97, age distribution of the 300 cases was in between 25-64.years In Heze area where BCS cases exist, iodine content of drinking water was 12.62-681.21 μg/L and the median was 262.05 μg/L.Furthermore, iodine concentration was in positive correlation with the incidence of BCS (r=0.846, P=0.008) .Conclusion We speculated that the high iodine content of drinking water was one of the causes of BCS.and further study should be perform to determine the correlation.