Clinical profile of tuberculosis in children up to 5 years of age

Abstract

Introduction: Tuberculosis as a disease is of great public health problem in developing countries like India. Children contribute a significant proportion of disease burden and suffer from severe form of disease, but because of difficulty in establishing an accurate diagnosis, data of disease burden in pediatric population is lacking. This study is an attempt to assess clinical profile of tuberculosis in children upto 5 years of age. Method: present study was conducted at Kamla Raja Hospital & Gajra Raja Medical College Gwalior over a period of six months. 77 cases up to 5 years of age were selected from inpatient department, who were diagnosed to have tuberculosis. A detailed history of epidemiological factors including past history of infectious disease, history of contact contributing to disease state was recorded on predesigned Performa. Complete clinical examination and laboratory investigation was done to confirm the diagnosis. Result: approximately 70 % of study group was distributed in 2-5 years of age group. Cases of CNS tuberculosis formed the main bulk to the study contributing 70.13% followed by intrathoracic (~16.88%), disseminated (6.49%), abdominal (5.19%) & lymphoid (1.29%) tuberculosis. Severe malnutrition, low socio economic status, illiteracy of parents were the important epidemiological factor affecting the disease status of child. Conclusion: childhood tuberculosis remained the neglected part in NTCP until RNTCP was introduced. Childhood cases have shown increasing trends with the advent of HIV infection. Prompt suspicion and early diagnosis can be an important step in controlling this epidemic.

A Study of Chest Radiographic Abnormalities and Mantoux Test in Pediatric Neurotuberculosis

“…It was also observed that Mantoux test was positive in only 6 (13.33%) out of 45 cases, however 50% of the CXR positive cases had positive Mantoux test. In a study of tuberculosis in children upto 5 years of age, 15 19% of patients with CNS tuberculosis had Mantoux positivity which is similar to that in our study.…”

Clinicopathological profile of children evaluated for suspected tuberculosis in a rural medical college hospital

“…In the present study, 45 children (44.1%) with suspected TB symptoms and 5 children (33%) of confirmed TB cases were under the age of 5 years, which was similar to the observations from the study conducted by Swaminathan et al [7] where 34% of confirmed TB cases were under 5 years. Slight male preponderance in the sex distribution, with a male-to-female ratio of 1.2:1, was observed in the present study which is also supported in other studies [8,9]. Despite the various issues associated with non-specific nature of symptoms, signs, and investigations and the emphasis on the various other difficulties faced in the diagnosis of pediatric TB, clinical features continue to remain the foundation of the diagnosis involved in TB [10].…”

“…In the study population, 43 children (42%) had cough in various forms, whereas Verma et al and Shrestha et al reported higher incidence of respiratory complications in 65.3% and 63.4% of cases, respectively [9,10]. Loss of appetite and fever were observed in 25% and 17.6% of the cases in the present study.…”