Risk Factors and Presentations of Acute Otitis Media in the Emergency Department of A Specialized Pediatric Hospital | ||||
| The Egyptian Journal of Community Medicine | ||||
| Article 8, Volume 36, Issue 2, April 2018, Page 79-86 PDF (297.04 K) | ||||
| Document Type: Original Article | ||||
| DOI: 10.21608/ejcm.2018.11053 | ||||
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| Abstract | ||||
| Background: Acute otitis media (AOM) diagnosis in children had always been a dilemma to diagnose, as children presentations usually are a combination of non-specific symptoms rather than an earache. Objectives: to identify the risk factors predisposing to AOM and the commonest presentations. Methods: Children presented with AOM to our hospital emergency department of age less than five were included. A thorough literature review was done to identify the risk and predisposing factors to AOM, data were collected using a data collection sheet which included the demographic data and the factors gathered from the literature over six months period between June and December 2015 all of the patients were presented in our hospital emergency department. Results: 112 children were diagnosed with AOM. The most frequently encountered risk factors for development of AOM was common cold (75%, n= 84), followed by crowding (63.1% n=70) and male sex (61.6%, n=69). Systemic symptoms were noted in the majority patients, fever appears as the commonest clinical presentation (80.4%, n=90) while convulsion is the least (15.2%, n=17), clear ear symptoms were not a constant presentation of our patients. It was found that an earache was statically related to older ages 4-5 years, while fever, irritability, feeding difficulties, and diarrhea were related to young ages of less than 1 year. Conclusions: the most frequently encountered risk factors for the development of AOM were a common cold, followed by crowding, and male sex. The most common clinical presentation among the children have AOM was fever, while clear ear symptoms were not constant presentations among our patients. | ||||
| Keywords | ||||
| Otitis media; Presentation; risk factors | ||||
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