Abstract
Objective: To determine whether the fever module in the WHO/UNICEF guidelines for the integrated management of childhood illness (IMCI) identifies children with bacterial infections in an area of low malaria prevalence. Methods: Physicians assessed a systematic sample of 669 sick children aged 2-59 months who presented to the outpatient department of Dhaka Shishu Hospital, Bangladesh. Findings: Had IMCI guidelines been used to evaluate the children, 78% of those with bacterial infections would have received antibiotics: the majority of children with meningitis (100%), pneumonia (95%), otitis media (95%) and urinary tract infection (83%); and 50% or less of children with bacteraemia (50%), dysentery (48%), and skin infections (30%). The current fever module identified only one additional case of meningitis. Children with bacteraemia were more likely to be febrile, feel hot, and have a history of fever than those with dysentery and skin infections. Fever combined with parental perception of fast breathing provided a more sensitive fever module for the detection of bacteraemia than the current IMCI module. Conclusions: In an area of low malaria prevalence, the IMCI guidelines provide antibiotics to the majority of children with bacterial infections, but improvements in the fever module are possible.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 1096-1105 |
Number of pages | 10 |
Journal | Bulletin of the World Health Organization |
Volume | 79 |
Issue number | 12 |
State | Published - 2001 |
Keywords
- Antibiotic prophylaxis/utilization
- Bacteremia/diagnosis/drug therapy
- Bacterial infections/diagnosis/drug therapy
- Bangladesh (source: MeSH)
- Child/Delivery of health care, Integrated
- Dysentery/diagnosis/drug therapy
- Evaluation studies
- Fever/drug therapy
- Guidelines
- Malaria/diagnosis
- Meningitis, Bacterial/diagnosis/drug therapy
- Otitis media/diagnosis/drug therapy
- Pneumonia, Bacterial/diagnosis/drug therapy
- Skin diseases, Infectious/diagnosis/drug therapy
- Urinary tract infections/diagnosis/drug therapy
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health