Retrospective evaluation of pediatric cases admitted to Bursa Uludağ University Faculty of Medicine Pediatrics Clinic for Recurrent pneumonia

In our study 152 patients that hospitalized for recurrent pneumonia between 25 May 2017 and 25 May 2022, in Bursa Uludağ University, Department of Pediatric Infectious Diseases were retrospectively analyzed. The mean age of patients who were diagnosed with the criteria for recurrent pneumonia was 21.36 ±1 6.61 months and 52% of them were male. Body weight in 44.7% was <3 percentile. 27.6% of the cases were premature and 12.5% of the cases were diagnosed as bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD). The underlying diseases were present in 92.7% of the cases, and the most common was neurological diseases (30.9%), congenital heart disease (CHD) in 24 (15.7%) and gastroesophageal reflux (GER) in 19 (12.5%) had bronchial asthma. The most frequent reason for hospital admission was cough with a rate of 73%. In the blood samples taken from the patients, leukocytosis was found in 25.7% and elevated CRP levels in 50%. İn 11.8% of the blood cultures pathogen microornganisms were detected and 3.9% of them was Staphylococcus hominis. Respiratory Viral PCR test was positive in 32.2% of the cases and the most common cause of viral pnömonia was Rhinovirus with a rate of 44.8%. İn all cases there were signs of infiltration on 84.5% of chest X-ray and 79.2% of thorax computed tomography (CT). 24 of the cases (15.8%) were admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU), 8.6% were intubated and 9.2% died. The cases with more than one underlying diease, the height and body weigh was found to be <3 percentile, and its statistically significantly higher than the other group (p<0.05). The correlation between the age of symptom onset and the age of diagnosis shows statistical significance (p<0.001). Considering the relationship between the presence of the underlying disease and the number of pneumonia attacks, the mean number of attacks per cases with cystic fibrosis (CF) (p<0.001), aspiration syndrome (p=0.007) and tuberculosis (TB) (p=0.003) was found to be higher. Key words: Recurrent pneumonia, underlying diseases, childhood.