林恆慶Ho JDTsai CTLiou SWTsai JFLin HC2026-05-252026-05-252008https://203.71.86.71/handle/123456789/37259● PURPOSE: To determine whether seasonal variation 
exists in the incidence of retinal vein occlusion. 
● DESIGN: Retrospective, nationwide population-based 
administrative database study. 
● METHODS: We collected data on outpatient and emergency 
visits for the period from January 1999 through 
December 2003 from the Taiwan National Health Insurance 
Research Database, a source that covers more 
than 96% of Taiwan’s 23 million citizens. In total, 
20,792 patients with a first-time diagnosis of either 
central retinal vein occlusion or branch retinal vein 
occlusion (The International Classification of Disease, 
Ninth Revision, Clinical Modification [ICD-9-CM] code 
362.35 or 362.36, respectively) were identified. 
Monthly incidence of retinal vein occlusion was obtained 
for each age group, each gender group, and for the entire 
sample. The autoregressive integrated moving average 
method of analysis was adopted to examine seasonality in 
the monthly incidence of retinal vein occlusion. 
● RESULTS: The monthly incidence rates of retinal vein 
occlusion revealed significant seasonality, with a clear 
peak in January for each age group and each gender 
group, as well as for the total sample. 
● CONCLUSIONS: Our study demonstrates significant seasonal 
variations in the retinal vein occlusion incidence, with 
the peak occurrence in the winter month of January. 
(Am J Ophthalmol 2008;145:722–728. © 2008 by 
Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)en-US醫務管理學系期刊論文article