Early clinical predictors for the prognosis of invasive pneumococcal disease

Background: Risk factors related to mortality due to invasive pneumococcal disease (IPD) have been unveiled previously, but early clinical manifestations of IPD based on prognosis remain uncovered.

Methods: The demographic characteristics, clinical features, serotype, antibiotic susceptibility, and outcomes of 97 hospitalized children with laboratory-confirmed IPD from Suzhou, China, were collected and analyzed retrospectively.

Results: The median age was 0.69 (0.49-1.55) years in the non-survivor group compared with 2.39 (0.90-3.81) years in the survivor group. The mortality of 97 children with laboratory-confirmed IPD was 17.5% (17/97), and 53.6% of them were aged less than 2 years. Pathogens were mainly from the blood and cerebrospinal fluid, and sepsis was the most frequent type. Statistically significant differences were found in hyperpyrexia, vomiting, anorexia, lethargy, poor perfusion of extremities, Hb level, and Plt count between the nonsurvival and survival groups. Further, the multivariate regression analysis showed that early signs, including hyperpyrexia, vomiting, anorexia, lethargy, and poor perfusion of extremities, were independent risk factors for the in-hospital mortality of children with laboratory-confirmed IPD. The mortality was also associated with antimicrobial sensitivity in pneumococcal isolates. The microbes in 1/17 (5.9%) children who were prescribed an antibiotic showed antimicrobial sensitivity in the nonsurvival group, compared with 21/80 (26.3%) children who survived. The most common serotypes identified were 6B (35.3%, 6/17), 14 (23.5%, 4/17), 19F (23.5%, 4/17), 19A (5.9%, 1/17), 23F (5.9%, 1/17), and 20 (5.9%, 1/17) in the nonsurvival group. The coverage of IPD serotypes of the 7-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV7) was 88.2% (15/17), while that of the 13-valent S. pneumoniae vaccine (PCV13) was 94.1% (16/17) of the coverage in the nonsurvival group.

Conclusions: Recurrent hyperpyrexia, vomiting, anorexia, lethargy, and poor perfusion of extremities in the early stage were independent predictors for the in-hospital mortality of children with laboratory-confirmed IPD. Appropriate use of antibiotics and PCV immunization were the keys to improve the outcome of IPD.

Keywords: Children; Invasive pneumococcal disease; Mortality; Risk factors; Serotype.