Article Sidebar
Article Details
Copyright remains in the Author’s name. The work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution - Noncommercial Works License. Authors are required to complete and sign an Author Agreement form that outlines Author and Publisher rights and terms of publication. The Agreement form should be uploaded along with other submissions files and any submission will be considered incomplete without it [forthcoming].
Material submitted for publication in the SAMJ is accepted provided it has not been published or submitted for publication elsewhere. Please inform the editorial team if the main findings of your paper have been presented at a conference and published in abstract form, to avoid copyright infringement. The SAMJ does not hold itself responsible for statements made by the authors.
Previously published images
If an image/figure has been previously published, permission to reproduce or alter it must be obtained by the authors from the original publisher and the figure legend must give full credit to the original source. This credit should be accompanied by a letter indicating that permission to reproduce the image has been granted to the author/s. This letter should be uploaded as a supplementary file during submission.
Main Article Content
Clinical Profile and Predictors of Severe Illness in young South African Infants
Abstract
Background. Most childhood deaths occur within the first 2 months of life. Simple symptoms and signs that reliably indicate the presence of severe illness that would warrant
urgent hospital management are of major public health importance.
Objectives. To describe the disease profile of sick young infants aged 0 - 59 days presenting at King Edward VIII Hospital, Durban, and to assess the association between clinical features assessed by primary health workers and the presence of severe illness.
Methods. Specific clinical signs were evaluated in young infants by a health worker (nurse), using a standardised list. These signs were compared with an assessment by an experienced paediatrician for the need for urgent hospital- or clinic-based care. Results. Nine hundred and twenty-five young infants were enrolled; 61 were <7 days old, 477 were 7 - 27 days old, and 387 were 28 - 59 days old. Illnesses needing urgent
hospital management in the age group <7 days were hyperbilirubinaemia (43%) and sepsis (43%); in the age group 7 - 27 days they were pneumonia (26%), sepsis (17%) and
hyperbilirubinaemia (15%), and in the age group 28 - 59 days they were pneumonia (54%) and sepsis (15%). The clinical sign most consistently predictive of needing urgent hospital
care across all groups was not feeding well. Among those over 7 days old, a history of difficult feeding, temperature ≥37.5oC and respiratory rate ≥60 per minute were also
important. Conclusions. The simple features of feeding difficulties, pyrexia, tachypnoea and lower chest in-drawing are useful predictors of severity of illness as well as effective
and safe tools for triaging o f young infants for urgent hospital management at primary care centres. Neonatal hyperbilirubinaemia, pneumonia and sepsis are the common
conditions for which young infants require urgent hospitalbased management.
South African Medical Journal Vol. 98 (11) 2008: pp. 883-888
