Abstract

SEHABIAGUE, Graciela et al. Infecciones respiratorias agudas graves del niño y su impacto en la demanda asistencial . Arch. Pediatr. Urug. [online]. 2012, vol.83, n.1, pp.7-12. ISSN 1688-1249.

Summary  Severe acute respiratory infections (SARI) in children have an important impact on their health. Intensive care assistance is required for those very severe cases, whose demand increases in winter. Our study aimed at describing the clinic-etiologic characteristics and outcome of the critically ill patients admitted to an special unit (URE) of the Pediatric Emergency Department. Also were recorded the services where the patients were referred after the most urgent assistance and the time of stay. A prospective descriptive study involved all SARI patients (n=204) admitted to URE between July 2007 and June 2008 (30,3% of total admissions). Patients (n=134) aged less than 12 months predominated; 64% were well nourished and 51% breast fed. Most frequent diagnosis at admission were pneumonia (n=111) and bronchiolitis (n=52). Viral diagnosis was achieved in 67 patients younger than 23 months as well as bacterial etiology. The majority of the admitted patients (78,9%) had respiratory failure and 40,2% required mechanical ventilation. One hundred and fifty four patients (74,3%) were referred to an intensive care service (7 died), meanwhile 52 patients (25,7%) were stabilized enabling their referral to a pediatric ward. In conclusion the URE assistance was crucial for the care of SARI enabling the respiratory estabilization. Additionally the data provided by this study, in future, will allow the evaluation of the benefits of the pneumococcal conjugate vaccine application

Keywords : RESPIRATORY TRACT INFECTIONS; RESPIRATORY FAILURE;     PNEUMONIA; BRONCHIOLITIS; INTENSIVE CARE.

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