By Yash Yadav
A new worldwide study provides a clear image of how Covid 19 has created an impact and its severe outcome on children around the globe.
The review was co-driven by a group of scientists from the University of Calgary’s Cumming School of Medicine (CSM), Ann and Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, and University of California-Davis Medical Center. It followed in excess of 10,300 children at 41 emergency departments in 10 nations including Canada and the United States, Italy, Spain and Australia.
Researchers followed more than 3200 children who visited hospital emergency departments and tested positive for Covid-19. Around three per cent (107 total) of those diagnosed with Covid-19 experienced serious results within fourteen days of their visit to an emergency room. Moreover, around 23 per cent were hospitalized for treatment(735 total).
Severe outcomes included cardiac or cardiovascular complications, such as myocarditis (inflammation of the heart), as well as neurologic, respiratory, or infectious problems. Four children died due to these.
“The study sought to quantify the frequency of and risk factors for severe outcomes in children with COVID-19. We found that older age, having a pre-existing chronic condition and symptom duration were important risk factors for severe outcomes.”
Dr Stephen Freedman, MD, study co-lead, paediatrician and professor at the CSM
“Fortunately, the risk of developing the severe disease in children with COVID-19 discharged from the emergency department is very low,” says study co-lead Dr Todd Florin, MD, MSCE, Director of Research in Emergency Medicine at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago and associate professor of Pediatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.
“Our findings can provide reassurance to parents and clinicians for children well enough to be managed in the community, while also providing important insights on which children may be at particular risk for severe outcomes.”
Albeit asthma was considered as a matter of concern for severe outcomes, this study was unable to confirm a link. It additionally did not find those very young infants were at a higher risk for serious results.
Dr Nathan Kuppermann, MD, MPH, chair of Emergency Medicine at University of California Davis Medical Center and co-lead of the study said, “With emergency departments across the world seeing an influx of patients due to the Covid-19 pandemic and stressing capacity, this study will help address the surge by providing an estimate of the risk among pediatric Covid-19 patients screened in an emergency department”.
“It will support emergency physicians triage of pediatric patients more efficiently by knowing who has risk factors for severe outcomes and focus advanced level care to those who do.”
The review happened within the Pediatric Emergency Research Network, a worldwide consortium of the world’s major pediatric emergency care research organizations. It got support from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Alberta Innovates, Alberta Health Services and the University of Calgary.
It likewise got Covid award financing from the University of California Davis, Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center and Ann and Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago. Dr Anna Funk, PhD, a disease transmission specialist and UCalgary postdoctoral individual, was the lead author of the study.
“There are no specific evidence-based treatments and therapies for children at this time and detailed research data describing outcomes in young people with COVID-19 has been lacking, so this study offers important insights that we believe will be helpful into front-line care providers treating children with COVID-19,” adds Freedman.
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