Pediatr Emerg Med J.  2021 Dec;8(2):51-56. 10.22470/pemj.2021.00353.

Occult bacteremia in children with simple febrile seizure in the post-pneumococcal conjugate vaccine era

• Yoon GS
• Chung HJ
• Byun YH
• Kim MJ
• Park SH
• Paek SH
• Kim OJ
• Kwon JH

• KMID: 2523995
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.22470/pemj.2021.00353

Abstract

Purpose
The authors aimed to investigate the utility of blood culture (BC) for children with simple febrile seizure (SFS) in the emergency department (ED) in the post-10/13-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV) era.
Methods
This study was performed at the ED of a tertiary care university-affiliated women and children’s hospital, and involved 3,237 previously healthy children aged 6-60 months who visited the ED with SFS from January 2013 through December 2017. The SFS was defined according to the International Classification of Diseases, 11th Revision codes related to seizure. The children were divided into 2 groups according to the vaccination rates of the period of their visit: the 70-PCV (70%, 2013-2014) and 97-PCV (97%, 2015-2017) groups. The primary outcome was the yield, defined as a true positivity of BC. In addition, we collected information on baseline characteristics, ED length of stay, inflammatory biomarkers, and ED outcomes.
Results
Of the 1,578 children with SFS who underwent BC, 1,357 belonged to the 97-PCV group. The median age of the study population was 22 months (interquartile range, 16.0-30.0), and 935 children (59.3%) were boys. Of the 41 children (2.6%) with positive BC results, 3 had the yield (0.2%): Staphylococcus aureus in 2 children and Streptococcus pneumoniae in the other. All 3 children belonged to the 97-PCV group. There were 38 contaminated BCs (2.4%; 95% confidence interval, 1.6%-3.2%). The 97-PCV group showed a shorter median ED length of stay (166.0 minutes [108.0-279.5] vs. 143.0 [109.5-209.5]; P = 0.010) and a lower rate of hospitalization (39.4% vs. 12.8%; P < 0.001). No differences between the 2 groups were found in the baseline characteristics and biomarkers.
Conclusion
This study suggests a low utility of BC in previously healthy children with SFS in emergency settings in the post-10/13-valent PCV era.

Keyword

Bacteremia; Blood Culture; Emergency Medicine; Pediatrics; Seizures; Vaccines

Figure

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  Fig. 1. Flowchart for the selection of study population. SFS: simple febrile seizure, ED: emergency department, PCV: pneumococcal conjugate vaccine.

Reference

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