Low rate of bacteremia in children hospitalized with pneumonia

Référence

Neuman MI, Hall M, Lipsett SC, et al, for the Pediatric Research in Inpatient Settings Network. Utility of blood culture among children hospitalized with community-acquired pneumonia. Pediatrics 2017;140(3):e20171013.

Sommaire

Using a health administrative database from 6 US tertiary children's hospitals, these investigators evaluated the prevalence of bacteremia in 7509 children aged 3 months to 18 years who were hospitalized with community-acquired pneumonia. (Children transferred from other hospitals and those with complex chronic conditions were excluded.) Of this cohort, 34% had a blood culture performed on day 1 or day 2 of the hospitalization. Overall, 2.5% of the blood cultures grew pathogens and 1% contained contaminants. Of the pathogens, 78% were identified as S. pneumoniae. Susceptibility to penicillin was tested on 61 of the 65 pathogens detected: 50 (82%) were susceptible, and the remaining 11 nonsusceptible pathogens represented 0.4% of the children from whom a blood culture was obtained. The rate of bacteremia in the subgroup of patients with severe or complicated pneumonia (ie, those who were admitted to the intensive care unit or required pleural drainage in the first or second day of hospitalization) was twice that of those without these factors present (4.2% vs 2.2%).